Some years back, a few people told me what I assumed was an urban legend about the wild parrot flock of Sunnyvale. When Marine World moved from the peninsula up to Vallejo, the story goes, a flock of parrots escaped and settled down in Sunnyvale. Residents will often report seeing a group of loudly squawking green birds. And, of course, the story teller always said he or she had actually seen and heard these parrots. I didn’t give the tale much thought, but I remembered it today when I noticed Yahoo’s Weekly Picks had featured The Wild Parrots of Telegraph Hill. No joke, there’s a flock of parrots in San Francisco. Ah ha, I thought, this is the flock of parrots I was told about, they are in San Francisco, not Sunnyvale. But, since the web was at my fingertips, I did a search, just in case. The first item listed a 1998 article from the city paper in which the reporter, having heard the same rumors, made some calls and verified that there is indeed an infamous flock of parrots in Sunnyvale, in addition to the flocks in Telegraph Hill and Palo Alto. There is an urban legend component of the story though. The birds are most likely descendants of escaped house pets, but creative myths have been circled regarding their origins: “they escaped from a sinking ship, a local pet story (sic) burned down, a smuggler lost track of them”. I like the one I heard the best, because it also gives you the history of Marine World. Most newcomers don’t realize it used to be a lot closer.