Parrots have a habit of picking up what they hear around them, and that includes foul language.

I resisted the urge to say ‘fowl’, so be thankful.

In some cases, parrots have actually been used to secure convictions in court, like the time a parrot named Bud repeated  “don’t f***ing shoot” in the voice of a man who was murdered by his wife.

The woman was handed a life sentence, so well played, Bud.

At a zoo in Lincolnshire, England, the swearing of five African grey parrots has been less helpful, reports the Telegraph, and they have had to be separated from one another:

The parrots – named Billy, Eric, Tyson, Jade [pictured above], and Elsie – joined Lincolnshire Wildlife Centre’s colony of 200 grey parrots in August, however soon started encouraging each other to swear.

“We saw it very quickly; we are quite used to parrots swearing but we’ve never had five at the same time,” Steve Nichols, CEO of the wildlife park, told the PA news agency.

“Most parrots clam up outside, but for some reason these five relish it.”

The parrots have since been distributed to different areas of the park so they do not “set each other off”.

It was a preemptive strike to split the birds up, because there hadn’t yet been any complaints, with Nichols adding that “when a parrot tells you to f*** off it amuses people very highly.”

The birds also noticed that swearing would trigger a response from people, like laughter or shock, which encouraged repeat behaviour.

Having developed the habit whilst in quarantine together, it is hoped that they will now pick up their natural call from other African grey parrots at the centre.

Kids are often given tours, so swearing is far from ideal, and Nichols said hat if he ends up with 200 swearing birds, he has no idea how he will cope with the problem.

Let’s finish with something slightly more terrifying than foul-mouthed parrots, and a viral video from earlier in the week, showing a child under attack from a dive-bombing magpie in New South Wales, Australia:

[source:telegraph]