A parrot stuck on a London roof treated firefighters who came to its rescue with a torrent of invective.
The London Fire Brigade was called amid concerns for the macaw - named Jessie - and its welfare after owners and the RSPCA failed for three days to get her down from top of a house in Edmonton.
In “an effort to bond with the parrot”, says the Evening Standard, the fire crew manager coaxed her with the words “I love you”, as instructed by animal experts.
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But the parrot told the firefighters to “f*** off”, according to a witness.
London Fire Brigade Watch manager Chris Swallow, who was at the scene, said: “Jessie had been on the same roof for three days and there were concerns that she may be injured which is why she hadn’t come down.”
“Our crew manager was the willing volunteer who went up the ladder to try and bring Jessie down. We were told that to bond with the parrot, you have to tell her ‘I love you’, which is exactly what the crew manager did.
“While Jessie responded ‘I love you’ back, we then discovered that she had a bit of a foul mouth and kept swearing, much to our amusement.”
Swallow said the bird also spoke Turkish and Greek, “so we tried telling her to ‘come’ in both those languages too”.
“Thankfully it soon became apparent that Jessie was fine and uninjured as she flew off to another roof and then to a tree,” he said.
Jessie “was later reunited with her owner”, says Sky News.