The wildlife presenter says that the urban myth is simply untrue because there must have been MORE than just one mating pair to create current UK population of 50,000+18:00, 12 Jun 2026Ring-necked parakeets are doing no damage to the UK’s wildlife landscape and it would be “reckless, culturally insensitive, and economically unviable” to try and remove them.‌So says Chris Packham, who has made a documentary about the divisive, bright green birds, which originated from northern Pakistan and now number in excess of 50,000 across the UK.‌While some people claim they are responsible for stealing the nesting sites of other birds and for damaging crops, the Channel 4 film speaks to experts who claim the parakeets are being unfairly targeted.‌Chris, 65, says there is no science to back the claim that they are an invasive species. “At this point in time, and remember science is always a snapshot, we couldn't unearth any evidence at all, either from the scientists, or the anthropologists and others that they were causing any damage whatsoever,” he told the Mirror.He said that fear of the unknown was behind those who have taken against them. “There is a genuine underlying xenophobia in life, which makes us fearful of change and new things. If we see rapid change, as we've seen with the expansion of the parakeets, it basically just frightens people. They think, oh my god, there's something wrong, we've got to instantly fix it. And of course, the most instant fix always comes from the barrel of a gun rather than from the data of a scientist and then an organised response.”‌But he feels there are huge double standards in play - because 48% of our terrestrial mammals originate from outside the UK including Little Owls, pheasants and Canada Geese, to name but a few.“I mean, what are you gonna do? There's four out of six deer species. Do we suddenly decide we're gonna exterminate all of those? Are we gonna exterminate all the brown hares? You know, potentially even harvest mice? There'd be nothing left.‌“I think we subjectively make up our minds, you know, this is again, it's a sort of a subjective judgement on those things which are either attractive or we think are benign.”Those seen in the film taking matters into their own hands by shooting the parakeets with air-guns are committing “random vandalism” which will do nothing whatsoever to limit the numbers. He said that it was now too late for any organised cull to work, and it would be “inordinately expensive” even if there was any merit in trying to get their numbers into a decline. “It would also be potentially dangerous because imagine gangs of blokes wandering around the London parks with 12 bores, I mean no one's gonna wear it, it's not gonna happen,” he said.Research has shown that many city dwellers - particularly younger people - are fans of the birds and are “not going to stand for someone saying they're going to gas them all or shoot them all”.Article continues belowIn the one-off special, Chris also puts paid to the urban myth that they are in Britain because Jimi Hendrix released his girlfriend’s pair of mating parakeets in the 1960s. Comparing the story to that of the Loch Ness monster, in that many want it to be true, he said: “The genetic studies have shown that they've come from a very wide and diverse range of sources. Releasing two birds, who might fly off in opposite directions and never meet again, they're never going to get a population going. In order to establish a population of anything, it's quite hard. And that would require multiple escapes or releases.”- Invasion of the Parakeets, Monday 25th June, Channel 4, 8pmLike this story? For more of the latest showbiz news and gossip, follow Mirror Celebs on TikTok, Snapchat, Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Threads.