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PARROT CONSERVATION: The Buffon’s Macaw
by
Rosemary Low
When The World Parrot Trust was founded in the UK in 1989 the status of most of the world’s approximately 330 parrot species was not well known. In the intervening 14 years many field studies have been carried out and much information has been gained. At least 28%, that is, about 95 species, are threatened with extinction. This is one of the highest rates for any major family of birds.
During the past two decades many parrot conservation programmes have been initiated to try to stop the decline of these species. Different aspects have been addressed, such as protecting habitat, declaring reserves or national parks, attempting to stop the capture of wild parrots, erecting nest-boxes for species whose nesting trees have been destroyed, and protecting birds at their nest sites and roosting areas. Unusual measures have been taken, such as growing food trees (licuri palms) for Lear’s Macaws (Anodorhynchus leari) by the World Parrot Trust and planting wax palms for Yellow-eared Parrots (Ognorhynchus icterotis) that rely on this endangered palm for food and nest sites.
The founding of the Trust by Mike Reynolds (owner of Paradise Park in Cornwall, UK), in 1989 was long overdue. The major worldwide conservation organisations had done little for parrots and there was no other group solely concerned with parrot conservation. Now the situation has improved, with a number of organisations worldwide investing significant sums of money in parrot conservation and smaller organisations and groups raising funds and supporting selected projects. But there is never enough money for all the projects that need funding. Many zoos worldwide have been involved, either with a WPT collecting box or for specific projects. This has helped to alert members of the public to the endangered status of many parrots.
In recent years some zoos have made significant contributions to parrot conservation through their bird shows. When flying parrots, they mention the plight of certain endangered species and, at the end of the show, invite contributions via The World Parrot Trust.
If you can find an enjoyable way of persuading members of the public to part with a coin of value, they eagerly line up to do so. At Paradise Park a beautiful Galah collects £1 coins from visitors after the free-flying parrot show. He drops the coins into a WPT collecting box – and raised £12,000 during the first two years! By April 2003, the total sum collected was £22,390. Free flight shows are highly effective in promoting environmental awareness and enthusiasm for conservation.
This money has been used to help the survival of the Great Green or Buffon’s Macaw in Costa Rica. The World Parrot Trust set up a special fund for this endangered and previously neglected macaw. During the past two years it has donated well over £20,000 to the project. When conservation projects commence and funding applications are made, it can be difficult to assess their potential value. So much depends on the dedication and expertise of the personnel. The best projects combine research with education among the people in the locality of the parrot. The press campaign organised by project members has reduced to almost nil the number of Buffon’s Macaws shot in Costa Rica.
Conservation of the Buffon’s or Great Green Macaw (Ara ambigua) was started in 1993 by George Powell, an American conservationist. He had invested a large sum of his own money into the Lapa Verde Project (“Lapa Verde” means green macaw). The international conservation community had refused funding requests. While in Costa Rica on holiday in 2000 I met the two people managing the project, Guisselle Mongas and Olivier Chassot. I was impressed by their dedication, and by further research documented in more published papers. But without funding, time was running out for this macaw in Costa Rica. It has a small range in Central America and is almost extinct in Ecuador (only about eight birds survive there), the only other country where it occurs. Compared with other large macaws, only the ranges of the Blue-throated (Ara glaucogularis) and Lear’s (Anodorhynchus leari) are smaller. Both these species are classified as critically endangered, due to illegal trapping.
Buffon’s Macaw occurs in lowland humid forest in Central America, from eastern Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica to Panama and north-western Colombia. It is seldom realised how small are the countries of Central America. At less than 51,000 sq km, Costa Rica is much smaller than the Czech Republic. The macaw’s breeding range there now covers only a small area, about 50,000 hectares, although it was once found over about one third of the north-eastern part of the country. Now only about 35 pairs breed annually in Costa Rica where the total population is about 200 birds.
Macaws are difficult to study, because they range over such big distances and spend much time high in the forest canopy. Telemetry is increasingly being used to track the ranges of birds and to discover details of their lives that assist in their conservation. But a transmitter had never been successfully fitted to a large macaw. With the help of an American macaw breeder, a device was tested on her birds. Similar transmitters were then fitted to wild Buffon’s Macaws. The transmitters are small and weigh about 3% of a macaw’s body weight. The radio-tagged macaws are tracked in off-road vehicles. This method resulted in invaluable information on diet, nesting habits and range. Observation of nests indicated that 60% of clutches produce at least one young to the fledging stage. First year survival of 23 fledglings from 12 nests was monitored. Fifteen of them survived until the start of the next season, when juvenile birds separate from their parents. That figure is interesting because even with most of our native British birds about one third do not survive until the following year.
Satellite images of the macaw’s breeding area in Costa Rica revealed that about 35% of the forest was eliminated between 1986 and 1992. Habitat loss is compounded by the felling of nest trees. Sixteen per cent of all the 60 nest sites known since 1994 have been cut down. Half of these were felled since the 1996 law that prohibits the cutting of nest trees and hollow Dipteryx, the tree species on which this macaw relies most heavily for food and nest sites. After several years a proposal for the establishment of a national park along the Nicaraguan border (the study area) was completed. The park has been designed (on paper) on the basis of the research findings, plus a wildlife corridor that would connect the proposed park with other major parks in Costa Rica and Nicaragua. This would allow the birds to migrate between breeding and non-breeding areas that are protected. It is very encouraging to report that the formal decrees for the implementation of the park were made in June 2003.
In May of 2002 I was fortunate to return to Costa Rica for my holiday. Guisselle and Olivier took me to a nest site. The road ran through secondary forest, where tapirs, peccaries and Crested Guans are sometimes seen, also past plantations of melina trees – grown for paper production. Soon we were on cattle pasture. Huge felled trees, laid where they had fallen, dotted the paddocks. They included the endangered almendro (Dipteryx panamensis). I asked Olivier why these trees had been felled. He replied: “Because these people feel it is necessary to tame nature”. The wood had not even been used. It was an appalling sight.
The road was muddy and slippery and our four-wheel-drive vehicle came to a stop several times to re-negotiate bad sections of the track. Then Olivier would jump out to put chains on the wheels – in torrential rain. After a few minutes he pointed out a distant almendro tree which contained the much-studied nest. Then, from a distance, I saw the pair fly in! It is always a thrill to see a species for the first time in the wild, but this time it was even more special – after 18 months of fund-raising for a species that has long been overshadowed by the blue macaws.
We drove up to the nest (in the middle of a field!) and parked under a nearby tree. When I saw a young macaw looking out of the spout nest entrance I was elated! It was a thrilling moment! One of the parents flew to the nest as though to encourage the young one to come out and explore the big wide world. He looked as though he might do so but evidently decided that he didn’t like the weather either! After a while the parents realised this and entered the nest to feed the young – yes, there were two! Then the parents sat high in the huge tree, preening each other, and a young one would make a sporadic appearance at the entrance.
Olivier said that the nest was so small it was not possible for the young ones to exercise their wings inside. Indeed, the nest was formerly used by a pair of Barn Owls. It was unusual for the macaws to chose such a small hole, and in an isolated tree in the middle of cattle pasture, although the forest was not far away. It was an ideal nest to study because the pair were used to the presence of the cattle farmers.
I felt deeply privileged to be there – the first visitor to this important nest. After an hour the torrential rain drove us away. Later I learned that the first youngster fledged the next day and that the other left the nest soon after.
Since my visit Olivier and Guisselle have protected all known nest trees with metal plates warning that it is illegal to cut these magnificent trees. Some highly successful conservation strategies cost comparatively little to implement. But the funding must continue. If you would like to contribute, please contact the World Parrot Trust at Glanmor House, Hayle, Cornwall TR27 4HY, UK or by e-mail at admin@worldparrottrust.org