A 32-Year-Old Parrot Named Spoodles Just Became The World's Oldest Living Parrot.
Spoodles, a plum-headed parakeet living in Charleston, South Carolina, has been officially certified by Guinness World Records as the oldest living parrot on Earth at 32 years and 86 days old, a milestone that is particularly remarkable given that the typical lifespan for a parakeet in captivity is between 15 and 20 years, meaning Spoodles has comfortably outlived the average by more than a decade. His owner Amanda Beth received him as a gift from her mother in 1997 when he was 3 years old, and he has been part of the family ever since, growing up alongside her through nearly three decades of ordinary life and extraordinary longevity. Amanda joked to Guinness that she has always told people he keeps not dying, so she just keeps feeding him. Spoodles is not quite as talkative as he was in his younger years, but he starts every single morning the same way he always has: with a cheerful and unprompted declaration of pretty bird, delivered to whoever happens to be within earshot.
Plum-headed parakeets are native to South Asia and named for the male's distinctive deep purple-red head, which contrasts with a bright green body and a long, elegant tail. They are considered highly intelligent and social birds, and those that receive attentive care in domestic settings have been known to exceed expected lifespans, though rarely by this margin. Amanda noted that Spoodles still has a cute little personality and appears to have picked up his warmth and chattiness from his first owner, whose kind nature Spoodles seems to reflect in the way he responds to the people around him. The previous record for oldest living parrot had been held by other long-lived species, and Spoodles surpasses them not with a dramatic flourish but with the same quiet consistency he has applied to every morning for 32 years. The bird who keeps not dying, as Amanda tells it, now has the paperwork to prove exactly how impressively he has managed it.
