The Parrot Brief: a drawing guide for first-year architecture students

The Parrot Brief is an audio drawing guide for first-year architecture students, devised in MP3 format, which received university learning and teaching innovation funding. It is downloadable from the School of Architecture’s digital studio, and also available for loan in the Avery Hill library. The guide can be played over and over again, repeating the same text as many times as the user requests, hence the name the Parrot Brief

Poll Pirate

A humorous essay on Parrots and parrot speech

Catching and displaying memory cues for a mobile augmented memory system

This report goes over and details the progress of the 2013 COMP477 project “Augmenting Memory: The Digital Parrot on Mobile Devices” undertaken by Jake Bellamy and supervised by Annika Hinze at the University of Waikato. The report begins with an overview on the problem with remembering events in people’s lives and details the background information on the Digital Parrot system. It also describes the previous project that preceded this one, which began to conceptualize the Digital Parrot on mobile devices. It analyses problems with the current design of the system and addresses them. The report then goes on to conduct an in depth user study with the functioning version of the software. The user study finds design flaws and incorrect functionality in the application that would not have otherwise been apparent. Finally, the report concludes with a proposed user interface concept that addresses all of the issues found in the user study and describes how the system would work. It describes the initial implementation that has begun in building this system

The only known egg of the Night Parrot? A molecular and morphometric assessment of an alleged egg from the Tanami Desert

The Night Parrot Pezoporus occidentalis is a much sought-after, recently ‘rediscovered’, endangered nocturnal parrot, endemic to arid Central Australia. Very little is known of its ecology, and its eggs have never been formally described. The literature on the eggs of the Night Parrot is collated here, and the provenance of an alleged Night Parrot egg found in the Tanami Desert, Northern Territory, in 1983 was assessed using DNA analysis and physical characteristics. Anecdotal reports from the late 19th–early 20th Century indicate that the Night Parrot lays a clutch of two to six roundish, white eggs. We suggest that its eggs are probably similar to and slightly larger than those of its congener, the Ground Parrot P. wallicus. The alleged Night Parrot egg was definitively identified by mitochondrial DNA analysis to be from the Brown Quail Synoicus ypsilophorus. This represents the first evidence of breeding by this species in the Tanami Desert, and lays to rest a long-standing misconception regarding the parrot

Estimating the population size of two critically endangered South Pacific parakeets : the Tasman Parakeet and Malherbe's Parakeet : a thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Conservation Biology, Massey University, New Zealand

The Cyanoramphus parakeets are a cryptically coloured group of birds that are distributed across the islands of the South Pacific region. Due to their restricted range and island distributions, species belonging to this genus are considered vulnerable to extinction. However, the extent to which these parrot species are threatened is difficult to determine due to an absence of accurate and reliable population estimates. This research aims to contribute to the conservation of two critically endangered Cyanoramphus parakeets by evaluating the survey methods currently used to estimate population densities. This thesis details the precision and efficiency of distance sampling methods used for monitoring low density parrot populations on small islands. Specifically, examining the annual variation in population size for the critically endangered Tasman Parakeet (Cyanoramphus cookii) and their introduced competitor, the Crimson Rosella (Platycercus elegans), to evaluate the effectiveness of conservation management and species control on Norfolk Island. In addition, the size of three translocated populations of the critically endangered Malherbe’s Parakeet (Cyanoramphus malherbi) were examined to identify if this endemic New Zealand parrot requires further management. Of the distance sampling methods used to monitor parrots, the fixed point survey method was the most suitable method for surveying Tasman Parakeets. This method yielded the highest number of parakeet detections per survey and offered the greatest count precision of the methods examined. On Norfolk Island, the Tasman Parakeet population increased by 126% over four years of intense predator management and nest provisioning. In comparison, the Crimson Rosella population remained stable, despite regular culling to control the population which competes with the Tasman Parakeet. In New Zealand, Malherbe’s Parakeets were detected with varying degrees of success. On Maud Island, no parakeets were detected; however, they were detected on both Blumine Island and Chalky Island. On Blumine Island, the Malherbe’s Parakeet population was moderately abundant, consisting of 202 ± 67 individuals distributed through the mature forest. In comparison, the Chalky Island population of Malherbe’s Parakeet was less extensive and consisted of 84 ± 58 parakeets. This research illustrates the importance of regularly monitoring the size of threatened parrot populations for conservation

An economic assessment of the potential for predator management to benefit Puerto Rican parrots

The Puerto Rican parrot is one of the ten most endangered birds in the world, with the only wild population comprised of 30-40 birds. Predation has been identified as one of the factors limiting Puerto Rican parrot productivity in the wild, and the loss of a very few birds can have a great impact on the species. Management of red-tailed hawks, and black rats, feral cats and Indian mongooses, as well as further management of pearly-eyed thrashers is potentially beneficial to the parrot population. Because funding for the recovery of this rare species is finite, an analytical examination of the economics of predator management as a species enhancement method can provide managers with a solid basis for justifying and implementing this management approach. We used a benefit-/cost analysis (BCA) to examine the potential Pareto improvements of predator management for protecting Puerto Rican parrots. The median and minimum expenditures aimed at parrot reproduction for both captive and wild parrots from 1997 to 2001 were used to define monetary values for Puerto Rican parrots. Predator management costs were estimated from existing US Department of Agriculture/Wildlife Services (USDA/WS) contracts for similar work in Puerto Rico. We examined the benefit-/cost ratios (BCRs) for predator management assuming one to five and ten parrots were saved by the efforts. Analyses were conducted separately for each predator species and all species combined. The primary analyses focused on the benefits and costs for predator management for the current wild parrot population in the Caribbean National Forest (CNF), but another set of analyses targeted the proposed Rio Abajo (RA) site for the establishment of a second wild population. This second set of analyses was more conservative than for the existing population because predator management costs were assumed to be higher. Even when using the minimum monetary valuation for Puerto Rican parrots, the prevention of a single mortality due to predation within the existing wild population results in monetary benefits slightly exceeding the combined costs for management of each predator species (BCR=/1.01). If median parrot values are applied, then only one parrot saved every 2.6 years allows the combined predator management to be cost-effective. If the year of maximal parrot values (averaged over captive and wild populations) is used, then only one parrot saved every 4.2 years makes application of all predator management methods cost-effective. Use of the single highest per-parrot value from among years and populations would result in the combined application of all forms of predator management being cost-effective if only one parrot is preserved from predation every 11.8 years. Assuming higher costs and minimum parrot values results in the combined application of predator management at the RA proposed population site to be cost-effective if 1.8 parrots/year are saved from predation. Use of median parrot value allows predation management to be cost-effective if one parrot is saved every 1.4 years. If actual costs for the RA site are the same as for the CNF, then the BCRs improve correspondingly. As more parrots are saved, the BCRs increase dramatically for each site

A molecular approach to reveal the genetic identity of parrot mussel and other sympatric mussel species distributed along the Kerala coast

Two commercially important mussel species are recorded from the Indian coast: green mussel Perna viridis (Linnaeus, 1758) and brown mussel P. indica (Kuriakose and Nair, 1976). Apart from this, a third type referred to as parrot mussel, which has shell shape of brown mussel, but with green shell colouration and suspected to be the hybrid of the above two species has also been reported from Kollam coast of Kerala, where both the species co-occur. In the present work, genetic identity of parrot and sympatric mussel species was determined using protein and genomic DNA markers. Protein markers viz. Sodium Dodecyl Sulphate Polyacrylamide Gel Electrophoresis (SDS-PAGE) and allozymes and the genomic DNA marker Random Amplified Polymorphic DNA (RAPD) were used for determining genetic identity of the three mussel groups. The green and brown mussels could be clearly differentiated using SDS PAGE. The parrot mussel protein pattern was similar to that of brown mussel, except for an additional band of molecular weight 48.7 Kda which is unique to brown mussel. Genus specific protein bands for Perna viz. 66 Kda, 43 Kda and 14.3 Kda, were detected in this study. Allozyme electrophoresis also followed a similar pattern. Of the 10 allozyme loci studied, seven revealed speciesspecific diagnostic differences between P.viridis and P.indica. They were AAT-1* (Aspartate Amino Transferase-1*), AAT-2*, ME (Malic Enzyme)*, PGM-2*(Phospo Gluco Mutase-2*), EST-1* (Esterase- 1*), EST-2*, IcDH* (Isocitrate Dehydrogenase)*. Parrot mussel shared all the alleles of brown mussel, and no hybrid pattern was observed. Species-specific alleles clearly differentiated green mussel from both brown and parrot mussel. The genetic distance of green mussel from brown mussel, estimated from allozyme data was 1.1145 and with parrot mussel it was 1.105. The genetic distance between parrot mussel and brown mussel was negligibly low (0.0005). Using allozyme and RAPD data, the Nei’s Unbiased Measures of genetic distance were calculated and the dendograms prepared based on these values clearly depicted the separation of parrot mussel from green mussel as well as the close resemblance of parrot mussel with brown mussel. The higher gene flow (1.1539) determined using RAPD marker also hints that brown and parrot mussel may be acting as single interbreeding population. Hence this study using molecular tools to test the genetic identity of parrot mussel has helped to conclude that parrot mussel is only a morphotype of brown mussel and not a true hybrid of the two