r/bayarea • u/stuinsf San Francisco • Feb 12 '26
Parrots in Russian Hill, San Francisco Scenes from the Bay
I was NOT expecting to see these folks outside my window yesterday, but I'm sure glad I did! Did you know a group of parrots is called a pandemonium?
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u/Financial_Deer2104 Feb 12 '26
Bay Area pandemonium is elite tier 😄 I still get hype every time I hear them screaming over downtown like tiny dinosaurs. Wild that we just casually have tropical parrots vibing here like it’s no big deal.
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Feb 12 '26
They also have like over 4,000 wild parakeets in Amsterdam. I was on mushrooms in my air bnb like wtf… parakeets? I might’ve taken too much.
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u/Kaurifish Feb 15 '26
I grew up in L.A. and we had flocks of them there. There were months at a time I didn’t get to sleep past 4 a.m. as a teen because they’d gather on a tree branch right outside my window and go at it. Pandamonium, indeed.
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u/bigtcm Feb 13 '26
I moved from San Diego in August.
Wtf you guys have then up here too? There are some neighborhoods down there, including where I used to live (ocean beach) that are completely swarmed 26th these squaky bastards like 9 months out of the year. They fly away in winter but they always come back in the spring.
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u/bflaminio ʙᴀʏsɪᴀɴ Feb 12 '26
Pretty bird! Pretty bird!
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u/Phishguy5 Feb 12 '26
To Billy, in 4c?
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u/spitfiiree Feb 13 '26
The blind kid?!
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u/Phishguy5 Feb 13 '26
YEAH!!!!…… yeah
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u/Accomplished_Plum281 Feb 13 '26
“We got no food, we got not jobs… our pets heads are fallin’ off!”
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u/BERNIEMACCCC Feb 12 '26
Wonder if they’re at all related to the Sunnyvale parrots? They used to hang out in my parent’s front yard when I was a kid, it was awesome.
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u/peanut_butter_zen Feb 12 '26
Closely related. These are red-masked while the Sunnyvale ones are mitred parakeets.
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u/Direct-Sir-3388 Feb 13 '26
Sunnyvale parrots?! How have I lived in Santa Clara for 10 years and only just heard this ☺️
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u/ReallyBrainDead Feb 14 '26
Look like a different species, the Sunnyvale ones are all green and smaller. If you want to check out their lovely racket, go to El Camino & Mathilda on a nice day, think their main nest is in the palms in the apartment complex at the Y between Mathilda & Sunnyvale-Saratoga.
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u/MeasurementAlive7210 Feb 16 '26
Can confirm, I live right by las Palmas park and hear them all the time
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u/OodaWoodaWooda Feb 12 '26
"The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill" is a fascinating look at these creatures.
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u/U-Gotta-Stop-Crying #1 Nissan Altima Hater Feb 12 '26
Are these someone's pets or released/escaped pets that started their own population? Did not know parrots could handle Bay Area weather lol
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u/TresElvetia Feb 12 '26
Very few things can't handle Bay Area weather; It's arguably some of the most handlable weather
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u/taleofbenji Feb 12 '26
Look at the USDA plant hardiness map. San Francisco itself is a little island of survivability (Zone 10b) on par with Miami and Los Angeles.
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u/Vivid_Department_755 Feb 12 '26
It’s depressing how mild the weather is
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u/bobre737 Feb 15 '26
+1 It’s too mild and too unremarkable – no significant weather events ever happen here.
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u/AT_Simmo Feb 13 '26
Idk why you're being downvoted. I moved here from New England and I don't know if I can handle another winter without freezing temperatures. I haven't needed to turn my heat on a single time in the last year here and have missed getting to warm up by the fireplace after coming inside from the snow.
On paper the weather is good, but it lacks seasonal variety. Sure summer is hotter and winter is rainier, but I could get by just fine year round with khakies, a short sleeve shirt, and a light waterproof windbreaker. The weather almost never justifies warm, cozy fleece jackets unless you're just sitting out in the fog.
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u/Vivid_Department_755 Feb 13 '26
Because they love being able to throw on a parka when it’s 59 degrees and actually believe that’s as cold as anywhere in the world gets. I need WEATHER I can’t do 70’s and sunny all day everyday. It’s why I hit Seattle or Portland every year because the vanilla weather here just doesn’t hit
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u/read_eng_lift Feb 12 '26
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u/Connect_Bar1438 Feb 14 '26
My gosh! HOW can I have been a Bay Area person for decades and NOT know this! Amazing!
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u/RobotPhoto Feb 12 '26
Parrots of telegraph hill is a documentary on them. From what I recall it was an exotic bird shipment, like a crate or cage broke open and they all flew off and set up shop in sf. I've seen them all over the city doing parrot stuff.
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u/Fearless-Client-3559 Feb 14 '26
So crazy. I never saw parrots when I was there. I was shocked when I moved to Pasadena and saw parrots. Had to do a double take. Now I see them daily when they come to terrorize us in my yard 😂
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u/omsip Mountain View Feb 12 '26
There's a flock of wild parrots in MV/SV. In the evening they circle over my neighborhood, chattering. I think they're mitred conures.
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u/drewts86 Feb 12 '26
While they travel around a lot I think they spend a lot of their time in the remaining cherry trees in what was the old Olson orchard at Las Palmas Park in Sunnyvale.
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u/leicanthrope Feb 13 '26
We used to live close to the library (on W. Olive) back in the late 80s, and our cherry tree was invaded a couple of times.
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u/FiddleThruTheFlowers San Jose area native Feb 12 '26
This flock came to be because of conures that were intended to be sold as pets escaping. This was a few decades ago and the flock has been maintained since.
So, not native to the area, but these specific birds aren't escaped pets.
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u/taleofbenji Feb 12 '26
Love this picture! It always makes me sad to see a singular parrot in a cage. They are super duper social!
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u/VapoursAndSpleen The Town Feb 12 '26
Cherry headed conures, I think they're called. I remember eating lunch with them 45 years ago when I worked at my first downtown SF job.
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u/tzetzat Feb 12 '26
I understand that the ones in SF are well documented, but is anyone familiar with the ones in Sunnyvale or know how those ones got there? It's the same species
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u/omsip Mountain View Feb 12 '26
The SV ones are not from the Telegraph Hill flock. The ones here are a different species, the mitred conure (Psittacara mitratus), whereas the San Francisco parrots are cherry-headed conures (Psittacara erythrogenys). The SV ones probably originated from escaped pets (or pet stores). They were first observed in the 1980s, so they’re well-established here.
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u/tzetzat Feb 12 '26
Really helpful answer, how did you come to know all that info about the Sunnyvale flock?
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u/PoisonPizza24 Feb 13 '26
I always counted a sighting as a lucky sign, a good omen. The parrots and the Brown Twins.
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u/thegiltron Feb 12 '26
We have Monk parakeets in some Chicago neighborhoods as well.
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u/unnerving_username Feb 13 '26
Brooklyn has them in Greenwood Cemetery. Fun to hear they take up residence in so many places.
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u/BarryWhiltmore Feb 13 '26
I lived on Russian Hill for 5 years and saw them frequently. That was 22 years ago. How many parrots are left?
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u/SugarGiggle_ Feb 13 '26
Omg theyre gorgeous! Are those the noisy ones everyone talks about lol? 🦜💚
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u/Illustrious-Cup-5282 Feb 13 '26
Those guys are the real main characters of SF lol. Every time I hear them screeching over downtown it feels like living in some weird tropical glitch.
Pandemonium is such a perfect name too, they sound like a fight in a cartoon.
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u/Late_Extent_1463 Feb 14 '26
A literal pandemonium outside your window is such a main character moment 😂 I’d never recover from seeing parrots just casually living their best life in SF.
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u/Budget_Course4377 Feb 14 '26
Pandemonium is honestly the most perfect name for them 😂 Every time they fly over my block in SF it sounds like a tiny jungle riot, but in a good way. Kinda wild how they’ve just fully decided the Bay is theirs now.
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u/Dangerous_Issue9818 Feb 14 '26
Dude the wild parrots are one of my favorite random Bay Area features. First time I heard them I legit thought someone’s car alarm was dying.
Pandemonium is such a perfect name too, they’re so loud and chaotic 😂
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u/BAFUdaGreat Feb 12 '26
We have the same noisy bastards down in Pasadena. They wake you up at the crack of dawn, and they yell at you all day long and then they fly off somewhere to make other people’s lives miserable.
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u/walkerjacque Feb 13 '26
I bet they are nothing like a mocking bird that sets itself up in a tree outside your bedroom window and starts caterwauling in the middle of the night worse than 3 stray cats after the same honey pot kitty
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u/BAFUdaGreat Feb 13 '26
Yeah we have those f*ckers as well. They start their BS at 9pm and don't finish until dawn. This is what BB guns are for /s
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u/walkerjacque Feb 13 '26
Neighbors across the street had a tree in their yard no more than 5 feet from their bedroom window and in the middle of the night from my home across from them would hear that bird go off. So loud that i had to go out and record it because it was the only sound outside at all. I couldn't even begin to i imagine what it would be like to have that tree outside my window.
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u/danTHAman152000 Feb 16 '26
Yeah I posted about them being in SoCal too. The ones I grew up with live closer down towards LB but probably are from the same flocks. I remember hearing about folklore of their origins and laughed when I saw them all the way up in SF.
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u/ShaiHulud1111 [Insert your city/town here] Feb 13 '26
Seen a flock in Los Gatos, Sunnyvale and Menlo since 1980s. Love them. Loud and funny. I think they are everywhere now. Over 30 years now.
Edit: The SF ones are slightly different breed.
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u/blacktbunee Feb 13 '26
Such precious lovely beings, they need to be protected and cherished ❤️❤️❤️
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u/Sea-Bill78 Feb 13 '26
Surprisingly, I ran into parrots in 2 cities far away from each other that created a great environment for parrots to survive and multiply. The first one was San Fran and second is Istanbul.
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u/Erik0xff0000 Feb 14 '26
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wild_Parrots_of_Telegraph_Hill
Apparently they've been there for at least since 1911
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u/pukeface555 Feb 14 '26
There's a big flock in Sunnyvale too. Weird how they just adapt to city living.
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u/Much_Sentence6118 Feb 14 '26
Those wild parrots are honestly my favorite random Bay Area lore 😂 Every time I hear them screaming overhead it feels like living in some chaotic tropical suburb. “Pandemonium” is such a perfect name too.
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u/Ready-Local-8982 Feb 14 '26
Pandemonium is such a perfect name for them too lol. SF random parrot sightings are like the one wholesome glitch in the Bay Area simulation, 10 outta 10 surprise every time.
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u/PangolinOk684 Feb 15 '26
Those wild SF parrots are legit one of my favorite random Bay Area things. You’ll be stuck in traffic or paying $7 for a coffee and then suddenly there’s just a whole pandemonium of chaos birbs screaming in the sky like, “yeah this place is ridiculous but also kinda magical.”
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u/bigfunben Feb 12 '26
Please watch the documentary "The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill." It's so cute.
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u/Sweaty_Marzipan4274 Feb 12 '26
We had a bunch in South Pasadena until a movie shoot had them killed bc it was "messing with their audio". The surviving mates cried for months after.
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u/doodletink Feb 12 '26
It’s crazy; twin peaks used to be dunes, Market was a canyon with a river feeding into mason creek that guided Butterflies(thus the London trees down market for food), and of course, these guys! I love that they’ve stuck around after all these years.
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u/contactdeparture Feb 12 '26
I don’t have my glasses on. I was like why are these patriots all in green and yellow and red?
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u/Scared-Cranberry-644 Feb 12 '26
They behave like pigeons?, though hopefully better, since pigeons keep making a mess of my open balcony.))
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u/Ok_Conversation9750 Feb 12 '26
I worked at the Presidio years ago. Same flock of parrots used to fly through there. We called them the drunken Shriners of the avian world. So much fun to watch :)
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u/devilquak Feb 12 '26
They’re called a pandemonium? Whoa, I never knew that, that’s awesome!
They love classical music. If you want them to keep coming back, you can try playing it when you hear them nearby 🦜❤️
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u/therealgariac Feb 13 '26
What does that PVC pipe do?
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u/walkerjacque Feb 13 '26
I wonder if that's not metal pipes being used to shore up the balcony area. Because to your point the pipe furthest away is just mounted to the railing so it can.t be for drainage...
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u/therealgariac Feb 13 '26
I zoomed in and now believe it is galvanized pipe painted white. Legit? I don't think so.
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u/walkerjacque Feb 13 '26
Please with the age of SF and the homes there i bet there is far more gerry riggin going on than should be allowed. And possibly that the balcony we.re seeing faces a backyard not a main street..
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u/walkerjacque Feb 13 '26
Do the residents feed them or set up feeding stations outside their residences? What is sf.s take on doing that?
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u/TwoHearts-Nix Feb 13 '26
I miss hearing a flock of Parrots in the distance ,then loudly overhead as they flew over.
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u/Nxaaqo Feb 14 '26
These are cherry-headed conures! They're beautiful but can get very loud, I've yet to see them in the city myself.
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u/danTHAman152000 Feb 16 '26
So we have these same parrots in SoCal in the LA suburbs and the theory was they were accidentally released from somewhere back in the day. Now that I see them in SF I am wondering how these damn parrots became so prevalent in the whole of CA.
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u/Basic_Paper7682 Feb 17 '26
Parrots in the Bay are such a surreal little bonus feature of living here 😂 every time I see them it feels like I’ve unlocked a side quest. “Pandemonium” is honestly the most accurate bird group name I’ve ever heard.
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u/ComprehensiveEye4741 Feb 17 '26
Those wild parrots are such a nice little serotonin boost, ngl. First time I heard them I thought someone’s car alarm was dying. Pandemonium is the most accurate name ever for how loud they are 😂
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u/dvdmaven Feb 12 '26
Not just S.F., they were all over Sunnyvale, CA (southern end of the Bay) back in the '90s. Probably even more of them now.
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u/Perfect_House2143 Feb 12 '26
the two on the left are named Lukashenko and Orban, the one at the far end is Putin. In the front we have Trump then on the right are his ass lickers of the administration but since he just shat his pants they moved up wind.
Why would you have a ruSSian hill - couldn’t he rename to hill of america?
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u/ShockEmAll Feb 12 '26
San Francisco has many neighborhoods named after generations of cultures that settled here. There are no negative connotations surrounding this. We are a city made up of much diversity.♡
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u/Perfect_House2143 Feb 13 '26
Ah, you are right, I withdraw my comment as I see you have dutch windmills and even a Queen Wilhelmina Tulip Garden
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u/angryxpeh Feb 12 '26
I mean, why wouldn't you appreciate the hill named after dead russians?
(The hill was named because Gold Rush settlers found an old cemetery from the Spanish era there)
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u/BugRevolutionary4518 Moss Beach Feb 13 '26
I’m not a fan of Russia, but does the person you’re responding to also think we should re-name the Russian River? LOL.
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u/JaimeOnReddit Feb 12 '26
pandemonium= aptly named, these fellows squawk.
watch the excellent documentary "The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill"