Five parrots separated at British zoo after encouraging each other to curse profusely at guests

Something a little lighter to break away from the politics of late. Some parrots at a British zoo had to be separated because they wouldn't stop encouraging eachother to swear at zoo customers.

www.cbsnews.com...

A British wildlife sanctuary has been forced to separate five parrots who wouldn't stop swearing at visitors. Keepers say the birds encouraged each other to keep cursing, and had to be moved from the main outdoor aviary.  

They recently joined the Lincolnshire Wildlife Centre's colony of 200 African gray parrots in August, were put in quarantine together and quickly overwhelmed the staff with their naughty language.

"We are quite used to parrots swearing, but we've never had five at the same time," the center's chief executive, Steve Nichols, told AP. "Most parrots clam up outside, but for some reason these five relish it."

According to Nichols, none of the zoo's visitors complained about the parrots, and most found them amusing.

Still, keepers thought it would be best to keep them away from children so not to ruffle any feathers. They were separated and moved to various different areas of the wildlife center so they are unable to provoke each other.

Nichols told BBC News that the parrots "swear to trigger reaction or a response," so seeing people shocked or laughing only encourages the birds to curse more.

"With the five, one would swear and another would laugh and that would carry on," he said.

Who knew parrots could be trolls too? Personally I think it's a missed opportunity, seems like the swearing parrots woulda been a big hit.

EDIT: What I could find for videos after a half assed search...I.didn't watch them but they seem related.

This would go viral on Tik Tok

LMAO XD

We have a geriatric cockatiel that has a potty mouth (drops naughty language with ease) When the kids' friends come over, they do enjoy talking to him & trying to encourage him to do some of his non-verbal sounds, like imitating emergency vehicle sirens (although not very well) or a dead-on imitation of an old cordless phone ring tone (that ring tone trick used to drive my late grandmother crazy, she kept him for several years after her own parrot died)

When the feathered smart-ass doesn't feel like cycling through his sounds, he just outright tells them to "# off/# you".
The kids laugh their asses off at it, but oookay children, time to go play outside and leave the bird alone, he's not in the mood for company, lol.

Birds are smart as hell, and can be damn funny, or damn offensive, with what they repeat. Depends on the observer's perspective

That's hilarious.

We need a video of this, however.

a reply to: dug88

This is awesome, but its 1,000 times more awesome with video/audio - someone PLEASE find it, it must exist somewhere!

Oh man I'm rolling one of the zoo keepers says "I get called a fat tw_t every morning" oh damn that's funny as hell

OMG, this is funny as hell! I’m just picturing five birds swearing at people and egging on more of it. I’d be laughing so hard if I were at that zoo. Can you imagine if they got the other 200 some birds swearing? Holy crap!

Animals are amazing. I call this the "monkey-see,monkey-do" effect.

It never fails pretty much no matter what critters you have, if one see's another one doing something an gets praised it doesn't take long for the other critters to get in on that action.

Altho these parrots are mastering "thug life".
(snickers!!!)

Won't the joke be on them if the notorious five teach their new flock mates this behavior and the whole sanctuary is beset with swearing birds?

African Grays are capable of it.

originally posted by: projectvxn
That's hilarious.

We need a video of this, however.

Yeah, bummed I can't laugh my ass off at these things.

originally posted by: ketsuko
Won't the joke be on them if the notorious five teach their new flock mates this behavior and the whole sanctuary is beset with swearing birds?

African Grays are capable of it.

Absolutely!!!
Spreading the smarts by relocating the birds is going to backfire.