UKH

Good Evening rock climbing photographers,

Chloe and I have a free flying macaw called Motley. I am sure he might have done a fly by to some of you at Millstone, Curbar, Higgar Tor, Roaches, Cratcliffe. Some of you might have spotted him at Thorpe Cloud, Stepping Stones, Mam Tor, Thor's Cave, etc. 

As parrot free flying goes, he is the only level 6 free flight parrot in UK. We try to show him new and exciting locations to fly, he loves diving of cliffs and gliding on wind updrafts! If you want to see some pictures of him, check out Motley's Adventures on Instagram, etc. 

We took him to High Tor a month ago and he loved it there but it is practically impossible to film him with Chloe's iPhone from the edge of the abseil points. We are looking for a brave rock climber and photographer volunteer who could abseil half way down the cliff face and take some videos and pictures of Motley! As a reward we could take a picture of Motley on your arm or your shoulder! He might be curious enough and land on you while you will be dangling half way down the cliff face!

Anyone interested?

 I'm sure you'll assemble a Motley crew! 

How exactly does a parrot qualify as a 'level 6 free flight parrot?' 

Sounds a great project - best of luck! 

They have to learn loads of stuff. Parrot fashion.

I've pinged a good mate of mine, climber, lives in Matlock, does a lot of photography, including abbing off stuff for that purpose.

I thought it was 1st April for a minute

Sorry 

Good luck with Motley 

We already have a Motley's Crew! It mainly consists of quite a few other large macaws that storm the skies and cause all sorts of chaos in the Peaks!

There are 6 levels. Each level ever increasing terrain, retrieval, and flight skill requirement. For example Level 1 will be a big flat open field with trees around the perimeter. If parrot freaks out and goes on a straight line flight, then it will end up in the trees at the end of perimeter and it will be easy to get him/her back! Level 6 is pretty much a big, tall, and steep cliff where you will have no ideas where the parrot went and retrieval is impossible. I wish there was an assessor with a tick list, but unfortunately the criteria is fairly simple - do I trust my parrot to come back if I yeeeeet him of this big cliff!

Brilliant! Thank you! Let's hope it will catch his interest!

Motley was on BBC, ITV4, quite a few newspapers, etc. He is very much real!

https://www.facebook.com/bbcsheffield/videos/motley-the-macaw-goes-viral/36...

That is off the BBC Radio Sheffield interview.

Enjoy!

That is really cool. 

Best of luck with this project. 

BB

But is a maccaw quieter than a drone?

Sounds good though. Hope to see him some day.

It really depends! If macaw is flying by, then you might hear a "woosh" sound or a draw out "hellllooooooooo" ! But it macaw does a flock call, then trust me, you'll hear it from miles away! 

You could cause absolute chaos by training him to shout out climbing calls such as 'Tight', 'Slack' and 'Safe', etc. 🧗‍♂️🦜🙄

Omg, there actually is a parrot! I think we saw Motley when we where at the bottom of Curbar but I just put it down to "I really shouldn't have left the glasses in the car". Wow 😁

Brilliant.  Would Motley soar a cliff alongside a paraglider?

I wouldn't take him to the Verdon if I were you.

jcm

Keep Lyra well back from the edge as we all know she has the self preservation instincts of a lemming. I hope you are both getting on well. 

We took him to Mam Tor quite a few months ago and he wasn't overly keen on paraglidera in the sky! He was very confused by them! I bet it Chloe was in paraglider, then he would try to chase her!

Verdon Gorge would be amazing! Updrafts could be very very strong! Any similar places in UK? Taking Motley to Verdon would be a bit too much of driving, he would get so bored and would start throwing tantrums! 

Well - it's in the literature!

https://www.mdpi.com/1424-2818/13/6/254/htm

For those with access. Includes a diagram of level 0-5.

My point was that the Verdon contains a good many absolutely enormous birds of prey, the size of young airliners. I’m not sure how well Motley would interact with them.

jcm

... And the Peaks (sic) has them bearded vultures, innit?