Free-range Parrots - a meeting with John Strutt in Cumbria
Sunday, January 7, 2007 at 10:56 
Scarlet macaw hanging around in the gutter.I'd first heard of John Strutt in 1999 via an Internet Forum - For the Love of Greys. I was seeking advice on free flying my baby CAG hen but the subscribers advised me to clip Artha 'for her own safety.' In one message I was told that someone in UK free flies a flock of greys. The writer doubted whether it was possible. Fifteen months later, I had tracked John down via The Parrot Society and he had invited me to Cumbria to see for myself.
So in June, we were driving from the railway station down blossom-edged lanes through the nearest village. Four blue and gold macaws swept past our car going in the same direction. It was like something out of Alice in Wonderland.
'Some of ours going home,' said John. Artha on my shoulder, wearing a harness, might have looked wistful if parrots can show that emotion.