THICK- BILLED PARROT BRINGS BIRDERS TO ENGLE
ENGLE, N.M. -- Wildlife watchers continue to flock to the Armendaris
Ranch headquarters to view a mysterious bird temporarily living
in a sparse patch of pine trees shading the sun-baked Chihuahuan
desert east of Truth or Consequences.
A thick-billed parrot, Rhynchopsitta pachyrhyncha, residing on
one of Ted Turner's New Mexico ranches has brought in viewers
from both North American coasts and Canada. In all, the parrot
watchers hailed from 24 states and four countries. This species,
you see, is considered endangered in Mexico and has not been seen
in the wild in Arizona since 1938. It was previously reported
in the Animas Mountains of New Mexico in 1917 and 1919.
"Nobody knows how this bird got here," said Tom Waddell, property
manager at the Armendaris. He first observed the parrot in a windbreak
of Mondell pines in his yard on May 7. Theories explaining the
bird's occurrence range from its being blown off course by
the tornado-spawning storms that raged through Texas and Oklahoma
the weekend of May 3-4, to it being an escapee from the illegal
parrot trade.
Waddell believes it's a wild bird. "There's no evidence
of it having been in a cage or anything," he said. "All its daily
behaviors, when it eats and rests, when it goes to water, are
exactly like a wild bird. And it doesn't touch commercial
parrot foods, either."
Rare species are nothing new to the Armendaris, the ranch manager
said. The ranch has endangered Rio Grande silvery minnows, Southwest
willow flycatchers, yellow-billed cuckoos and desert bighorn sheep.
"And we're working on getting aplomado falcons," he said.
The parrot has created quite a stir in Engle, a town with only
five houses. "I am receiving 100 to 200 phone calls every day,"
said DeAnne Wayne, office manager for the Armendaris. "And Tom
has had a lot of activity at his house. He wakes up with birders
in his yard and he goes to bed with birders in his yard."
Waddell isn't complaining. It's not bad. I've
never seen a better class of people in my life," he said. "Birders
are a great bunch." All birders are expected to sign a waiver
before venturing onto the Armendaris, Wayne said. A total of 435
of them had visited as of June 3, but the ranch crew is still
counting.
The non-native pine trees could be key to the parrot staying
at the Armendaris so long, Waddell said. "The Mondell pines have
cones at a time when our native New Mexico pines don't,"
he said. The parrot is regularly observed chewing up the cones
on the trees at Waddell's yard. In the wilds of Mexico, thick-billed
parrots live in pine forests in the northwest corner of the Sierra
Madres where cones are available through much of the year. Some
parrot observers doubt the bird arrived at the Armendaris without
human assistance of some sort. They note that it would have had
to cross hundreds of miles of unsuitable habitat to find the island
of pines and that it would have been hard to miss a flock of such
colorful, noisy birds in mountains closer to Engle than the Sierra
Madres. The illegal trade of wild-caught birds along the U.S.-Mexico
border is a likely candidate in their opinion. A bird record committee
of the New Mexico Ornithological Society will evaluate the parrot
sighting in an attempt to determine if this is a naturally occurring
wild parrot or if it can be accounted for by some form of human
release.
If not the illegal parrot trade, another type of human release
could explain this bird's appearance at the Armendaris. Helen
and Noel Snyder are wildlife biologists from Portal, Ariz. Between
1986 and 1993 the Snyders conducted an experimental release of
thick-billed parrots in the Chiricahua Mountains of Arizona.
"After their radios went dead," Helen explained, "we had sporadic
reports of a flock of parrots between the Mogollon Rim north of
Clifton and the San Luis Mountains of northern Mexico, which are
south of the Animas Mountains of New Mexico. The reports were
common enough that it was likely that the birds were going back
and forth."
Helen often flew airplane surveys looking for the released parrots
because her husband doesn't like to fly. She says the parrots
are strong fliers capable of traveling the 250 miles between the
Chiricahua Mountains and the Mogollon Rim. They also are long-lived
birds. Among the individuals they released in Arizona was a parrot
that was held in captivity at the San Diego Zoo in the 1950s.
"He bred in captivity for 30 years," Helen said, "and he was on
the cover of ZooNooz, a publication of the San Diego Zoo, in 1958."
Helen offers three explanations for the mysterious Armendaris
parrot:
1. It is a wild bird from Mexico that was simply on the move
searching for pine-bearing cones. Helen said the Portal, Ariz.,
country is seeing some unusual species this year - Clark's
nutcrackers and pinon jays - which could indicate a cone crop
failure in the species' normal wintering area.
2. This bird is the offspring of one of the parrots she and Noel
released in Arizona that for some reason split off from the flock
and found the Armendaris pines to its liking.
3. It is a recently trapped escapee from parrot smugglers, although
she said the excellent condition of its wings makes it unlikely
it had been held in a cage for too long. Also, parrot smugglers
usually disable the birds by removing flight feathers in one manner
or another. "My gut feeling is this is probably a wild bird,"
Helen Snyder said. "There isn't any clear evidence
either way, but there definitely isn't any feather damage."
Ironically, the Snyder's parrot release program in the Chiricahuas
began because the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service was confiscating
quite a few thick-billed parrots from smugglers, Helen said. Smuggling,
however, has decreased, she said.
All three options will be considered carefully by the bird record
committee, said Chuck Hayes, an assistant chief of Conservation
Services for the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish. Although
the parrot's true origins may never be determined, he said,
as long as it remains in Engle the thick-billed parrot will continue
to draw a crowd to an otherwise quiet desert town.
