Offside: Invasion of the parakeets

It’s our old friend the rose-ringed parakeet (Psittacula krameri), a bird native to Asia and Africa that has taken over Brussels to the extent that the city council was thinking of either sterilising them or killing them off. Now we learn from Natuurpunt that the bird is making inroads in Flemish Brabant.

The parakeets are the descendants of about 40 birds imported to Melipark at Heizel and freed when the park closed down to make way for Bruparck in 1974. That small flock grew into a population of between 3,500 and 5,000 pairs.

“In Diest, there was a sighting of 15 birds,” Jorg Lambrechts of Natuurpunt told Het Laatste Nieuws. “It’s not a big figure, but, given their rapid breeding, it’s a cause for concern. They thrive in parks and rural areas; if this trend continues, we’ll be looking at an invasion of Diest and the rest of Hageland very soon.”

That’s a problem for local birds: the parakeet doesn’t build a nest but simply takes one over from another bird, like the woodpecker, the nuthatch or even the bat. It’s also bad for farmers and growers. “Because they feed on seeds, shoots, buds and fruit, they could in time cause serious damage to local agriculture,” Lambrechts said.

Natuurpunt is calling on the Flemish and federal governments to take steps, though what steps still isn’t clear. One suggestion is large-scale netting of the birds, which is easier said than done, and would probably require the birds to be destroyed.

In the meantime, Natuurpunt advises residents not to feed the birds and under no circumstances to provide nesting boxes for them. “We have to, at all costs, avoid our region turning into their nesting place,” Lambrechts said.

Photo by ArnoutVos/Wikimedia Commons