I have heard that in the 1960's many parakeets were kept as pets, and there were, of course, escapees. Now there is a flock of these wild parakeets in Jerusalem, and I see and hear them regularly. The males have black under their bills and a rose-colored ring around their collar, as can be seen here. The birds are about 41 cm (16 inches) long including their 25 cm tails. Recently (June, 2005) I heard that some people think that these are not escapees, but that they are birds that got here naturally from Africa.

Clicking on any of the pictures above or below will give you a higher resolution image.

There is a place I call the Parakeet Tree on Rachel Imenu in the German Colony where they flock at night just before sundown, but I have not yet gotten good pictures due to some technical problem. As you can see, there were 11 parakeets in the tree when I took this photo:

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This male's picture was taken on April 15, 2004, on the side of the Misrad HaBriut office on Ben Tabai:

Here is a female right outside my bedroom window eating cypress cones on July 11, 2005.

And here is the same individual, probably, on July 19, 2005. Note the second parakeet as well.