A Scottish man has claimed that a parrot robbed £600 in cash from him during his holiday in New Zealand.
He had been driving around the South Island of New Zealand in a campervan, when he stopped to take pictures of the scenery. He got out of his car to photograph a kea (a species of parrot native to New Zealand) that had stopped nearby.
As he strolled around the area, the bird reportedly flew into the open windows of his campervan and lifted $1100 of the local currency from the dashboard inside.
This was apparently not the first incident of this kind. In that area the birds are well known for their intelligence, and have been blamed for vandalising cars, including breaking off wing mirrors and stripping rubber from windscreens. Zoologist Mark Cawardine describes them as “a devilish mountain parrot feared by hire car companies.”
The incident was reported to the police, but the chances of retrieving the currency remain slim.“The officer was very serious for the first few questions,” the man said. “Then he said, ‘Do you mind if I just stop to laugh?’ I suppose I can’t blame him.”
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