Kingston Parakeets - Parakeets in Britain

Parakeets in Britain

Escaped parakeets have been spotted in Britain since the 19th Century, the first recorded sighting being in 1855. The numbers remained very low, however, until the mid-1990s, when the population appeared to start increasing rapidly. While parakeets have been spotted as far north as Manchester, they are most common in the southeast of England, and the largest population (6,000 in a single flock) is believed to exist in the South London suburbs where, until 2007, the birds nested principally in Esher Rugby Ground (known locally as "Grists"), Esher. The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) estimated that there would be a population of 50,000 wild parakeets in Britain by 2010.