The black-cheeked lovebird (Agapornis nigrigenis) has total legal protection and trade has been reduced significantly. Its status has been downgraded from “Endangered” to “Vulnerable” (BirdLife International, 2000) although it may not have recovered its natural population density since heavy exploitation in the 1920s. (source: the above birdchannel article)
It has legal protection now, but at one point there wasn't any. Just as at one point it was legal - or there were no laws - to stop someone from going into a jungle and stealing eggs/babies from nests or netting adult birds. I would have to do some more research (but I need to go to bed - way past bedtime
)but I believe the parrot explosion - trade into North America - happened largely in the 70s, 80s and 90s. CITES - the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species was founded in 1975. That is when countries started to agree the situation needed to be regulated and monitored etc. I am not aware of all the ins and outs but countries can add and subtract birds from the lists allowed to trade freely, with permits, or not at all. Based on the above quote, it looks like the birds were heavily exported in the 1920's. Some of those birds would have likely ended up here plus some people in Europe likely continued to breed them and get new stock when they could. These birds would have been 'grandfathered' as legal and bought and sold/traded etc. If they became hard to get people would breed to other lovebirds to get similar looking birds. Have you ever tried to cross a border with a parrot? Or do you also have finches? Are you familiar with the Strawberry finch? It was once cheap and plentiful. Then the country decided they would not export them. Price shot up. Just last September a new legal shipment became available. Estimates vary from 1500 to 2 maybe 3000. They sold relatively quickly considering the prices were $300 a pair in Canada and a little cheaper in the US. Canada is still about $250 a pair but I think in the US they are anywhere from $180 and up. Its all about supply and demand. Hopefully with the internet and places like this forum people will continue to network and share their breeding experience so that healthy 'caged' strawberries can be developed in both countries and few wild caught birds will be needed to improve bloodlines. Inbreeding will eventually be a big problem without good records. Budgies actually are a concern. Their life expectancy has been greatly decreased because of it.
Its been great 'chatting' but I gotta' go. Goodnight.