Foster homes sought for rescued parrots

DAMASCUS -A bird rescuer is looking for foster homes for dozens of birds that were, he said, living in filth in a breeder's Montgomery County home.

Brian Wilson, founder of the Damascus-based Wilson Parrot Foundation, was with a group that plucked macaws, cockatiels and conures from the home at the end of last month. Thirty of the 81 birds have been placed in foster homes, Wilson said, and the rest have joined the 32 birds already staying at his in-house shelter.

Wilson is sorting out the legal issues associated with his midnight rescue, first reported yesterday by the Frederick News Post. He said he and his all-volunteer association were tipped off to the presence of the birds by the breeder's aunt, who told him that she had tried reporting the problems to various animal-interest groups but did not hear back from them.

Officials with the Montgomery County Police Department's Animal Services Division did not return messages seeking comment yesterday.

The breeder is an animal lover who "just realized that he was over his head," said Wilson, who declined to identify the breeder or the aunt.

Wilson, a retired firefighter, said he became interested in rehabilitating birds in part because they helped rehabilitate him. After a car crash in 1995 left him seriously brain-damaged, listening to birds helped him regain his ability to speak, Wilson said.