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Talking pet starling

Not to give anyone any ideas, but in the United States, it's legal to own a European Starling as a pet (or pretty much do anything you want to them, as long as you don't run afoul of animal cruelty lawas). Here's someone in (apparently) South Carolina who has one, and has taught it a few phrases to speak. It's interesting how the quality of its voice is different from other talking birds.

http://myspace.com/talkingstarling

Edited to Add:

Interesting article about starling song choices: http://www.nwf.org/nationalwildlife/article.cfm?issueID=104&articleID=1323

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The mockingbird that lives in my yard likes to imitate ambulances and car alarms. It cracks me up.

I didn't know they could talk.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4DKtj4E_iss

Video of starlings flocking. Imagine if they were all speaking, in unison...

Aw crap. Starlings are one of my favorates. Yes it's interesting that they can talk, but unless this bird was rescued the thought of keeping it in a cage makes me go all.....eurgh.

...ok I see he gets to fly about outside and stuff. Still hope it doesn't give anyone the idea that this is an ideal pet - they are damn noisy for a start!

His voice sounds like one of those artificial voice boxes (my fiancee calls them cancer kazoos).
I wouldn't want one of those birds. I think they are gross and grubby. Plus he's got a wicked looking beak.

I knew a parakeet (budgie) that talked the same way. He was fond of telling everyone what a pretty bird he was, catcalling when he saw himself in a mirror, and imitating laughs.

Hey,

Starlings are considered feral pests here Down Under. They're shot and poisoned like nobody's business, unfortunately.

Undisputed champion of avian mimics is the male Aussie Lyre Bird. They have no calls of their own, but "steal" the calls of other birds, and give a perfect, "playback quality" of the song of kookaburras, magpies, crows, roosters- and not just birds either, but also kangaroos, dingoes, chainsaws, typewriters, SUV engines... David Attenborough once filmed one, and it started making the whirring sound that his camera was emitting!

I posted a link to the video of that lyrebird a while back. Maybe in my "videos" tag?

No, no. My "david attenborough" tag will work, or "lyrebird."

As I recall, there was some discussion about whether the chainsaw sound it made was real or not.

I met a couple at a street fair here who had a pet starling. They even let me hold it - well I mean it perched on my finger. Cute little thing - their plumage is irridescent and just beautiful. They are considered pests out here, too, and this is probably why it's lawful to keep one as a pet.

If I was going to keep a bird, I think this would be a nice idea. But I wonder, they're SUCH serious flocking birds, wouldn't a single, solitary one in a people house eventually just go insane without 5,000 of his friends around all the time?

Loved the video of the group flocking before roosting for the night - looks just like a huge school of fish in the sky. Surreal. LOVED IT. :)

Right. You are allowed to own one as a pet (or poison them, or catch them and bake them into a pie) because they are non-native, and therefore not protected by the International Bird Act Treaty.

Isn't there some special story about how they were introduced here?

(This past weekend I shot a great picture of one, though, perched on a street sign.)

European sparrows and starlings are both introduced species in the US as I recall.

I beg of you, click the link above for European starling. The story is there. House sparrows have a slightly different story. Together with pigeons, I call them the big three. (of introduced urban birds)

I beg of you, click the link above for European starling.

In the name of all that is holy?

Or Unholy, as you prefer.

Y'know, seems like Shakespeare fans have played hell with our delicate American ecosystem, doesn't it?

I'm sorry I can't find the article, but I recently read in hard copy (I believe it was Audubon) about a study where starlings were kept in researchers' homes for spans of 12 months or more to study their ability to mimic. What the researchers found was that starlings were easily able to learn to mimic phrases, songs played by musical instruments, and other, less "songlike" noises (I think one mimicked a coffee grinder) but that rather than simply repeating what the heard, the starlings would pick and choose what they wanted to use as song. So for example, one bird would repeat a phrase from a piano piece, but cut out before the pause at the end of the phrase. Another example was of one who screamed, "I have a question!" while receiving medical treatment. I wish I could find the article; it raised some interesting questions about the ability to interpret as well as learn. I believe the article title was "Why you can't teach a starling to sing."

Here's a link to the article you mentioned.

http://tinyurl.com/hoc6s

Thank you, and I heart your icon.

Yowza, I've never seen anything like that in the whole of my life...and here I naively thought that Ravens had the market cornered in bird mimicry.

Hi - very interesting thread ;-) Does anyone know of any reference sources concerning ravens and crows mimicking other birds/animals/sounds?

If you do, could you e-mail me at matthewtoor@yahoo.co.uk?

Many thanks

Matt ;-)

I have raised 2 pet starlings. The first was nearly dead when I found her (she was non-moving & even even COLD!), and I let her fly around to get her winging ability up, hid tidbits in pots of cat grass for her, and she flew out to join a few other birds during mating season. I have seen her with a few other birds in my area (her beak hadn't changed color to the yellow-breeding color & she raised her headfeathers in excitement when I called to her). The next baby starling came to me from a house being demolished - the mother left the nest and he was the only one left alive when I got to him. Fortunately for him, I missed my 1st starling so much, I had got a budgie. Now he and the budgie and me are a "flock" of sorts - he mimics that budgie perfectly, they chase each other and play, but he also likes one-on-one time sitting on me. I am working on teaching him to talk. I think if your pet starling has a big area to roam (mine has its own room it shares with the budgie), lots of nutritious and varied food, and at least one other bird, it's probably better off than left dead in a trash can or construction site somewhere. I had always considered them pests (and many years ago even shot one!) until I saw one up close and they captured my heart.

i to have raised one it was just three days old,, when i found him,, he can never be turned lose in the wild for i have made a imprint on him,, they are a hand full,, i had to feed him every 15 to 20 min,,for 12 hours straight till he got feathers it was a chore and im still hand feeding him,and he is old enough to feed his self he just likes the hand outs,,lol,,he is 3months old now and i cant imagine life with out him,,he was worth all the long hours ,, hes alot of laughs,,

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