YOUNGWOOD — County prosecutors have dropped their challenge of a court order that a pet parakeet be returned to a Western Pennsylvania woman, even though it is an illegal species that prompted the Pennsylvania Game Commission to seize the bird last year.

Westmoreland County prosecutors planned to comply with the order after a meeting in the judge’s chambers Monday.

The bird’s owner, Faith Good, 63, of Youngwood, has pleaded guilty to several citations and paid a $500 fine for keeping an illegal bird — but she also sued the Game Commission for the Monk parakeet’s return.

County Judge Gary Caruso agreed with the Game Commission that the bird was illegal, but still ordered its return because Good bought it as a family pet two decades ago, not knowing it was an illegal species. The judge’s order requires Good to keep the bird indoors and not allow it to mate.

Monk parakeets can tolerate Pennsylvania’s colder temperatures and are known to proliferate if they escape to mate in the wild, the Game Commission has argued. The birds can ruin crops and can build nests on power lines, which could cause outages.