Staff writer
When Zark the talking parrot of Florence was first introduced to readers in May, she was emerging from a fowl case of identity crisis.
Zark had lived with Junior and Ginny Grimmett of Florence for 27 years when, to their utter surprise, she laid an egg. A bird that was thought to be male became female overnight.
If any more proof were needed that Zark is a female, she provided it last week.
Junior took the cover off Zark’s cage one morning and discovered an egg on the floor of her cage. They left it in the cage for a few days.
Last Wednesday, Zark started acting strange. She squatted on the floor of her cage. The Grimmetts let her out in the evening, as they usually do. She perched on her cage for a while and then went to sit beside them, mumbling incoherently.
“She started acting weird,” Ginny said. “She kept getting down on the floor.”
She put Zark back in her cage, and lo, and behold, she laid another egg. Ginny removed the egg before the couple went to bed.
That was the wrong thing to do. Zark missed her egg. She kept ringing the bell in her cage and waking Ginny all night long.
Early the next morning, Ginny placed the egg back in the cage, and the bird settled down.
“She got down and played with it every so often, rolling it around,” Ginny said.
“It seemed strange for her to be laying eggs at this time of year, but Junior reminded me that Zark is a tropical bird, so this might be her normal time.”
On Tuesday, Ginny reported that Zark had knocked the egg against the cage and had broken it, so the bird is adjusting to living without it.
“She’s not very happy about it, but she’ll get used to it,” Ginny said.