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Red-shouldered Macaw - BirdForum Opus

Photo by Lucas Leuzinge
Fazenda Barranco Alto, Pantanal, Brazil
Diopsittaca nobilis

Includes: Southern Red-shouldered Macaw or Noble Macaw

Identification

30 cm (8 -9 Inches). The smallest Macaw. Almost entirely green with a red "shoulder" and restricted exposed facial skin.

  • upperparts bright green
  • forehead mid-blue
  • underparts olive-green
  • wings green with prominent red wing bend or "shoulder"
  • underwing (flight feathers) and undertail a darker shade of yellow-olive green but with a larger red patch on the lesser and median underwing coverts
  • eyes orange
  • orbital skin bright white, reduced in area (restricted to the eyes and loral area)
  • tail long, narrow
  • head large
  • bill black or bicoloured with a pale upper mandible (subspecies dependent)

Juvenile is duller lacking the red shoulder and blue forehead

Distribution

South America: found in Peru, Bolivia, Venezuela, the Guianas and Brazil. An introduced population in Sao Paulo city. Everywhere threatened by trapping.

Taxonomy

The species has in the past been placed in genus Ara.

Some authors elevate the southern subspecies as "Southern Red-shouldered Macaw" or "Noble Macaw", D. cumanensis (e.g. reference [4])

Subspecies

Clements recognises the following subspecies [1]:

  • D. n. nobilis: Eastern Venezuela to the Guianas and northern Brazil north of the Amazon. [the smallest subspecies with all-black bill]
  • D. n. cumanensis: "Southern Red-shouldered Macaw". Northern Brazil south of lower Amazon to north-eastern Brazil [larger than nobilis; bill with whitish upper mandible]
  • D. n. longipennis: "Southern Red-shouldered Macaw". South-eastern Peru and north-eastern Bolivia to central and south-eastern Brazil. [larger than cumanensis; bill with whitish upper mandible]

Habitat

Tropical lowlands, savanna, marshes, gallery forest.

Behaviour

Diet

The diet includes seeds, berries, fruits, and blossoms. The usually feed in the tops of trees and bushes.

Breeding

They usually nest in a tree hole. The 2-5 eggs are laid two days apart and are incubated for about 24 days. The young fledge at around 8 weeks.

References

  1. Clements, J. F., T. S. Schulenberg, M. J. Iliff, D. Roberson, T. A. Fredericks, B. L. Sullivan, and C. L. Wood. 2014. The eBird/Clements checklist of birds of the world: Version 6.9., with updates to August 2014. Downloaded from http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/download/
  2. Handbook of the Birds of the World Alive (retrieved February 2015)
  3. Wikipedia
  4. HBW and BirdLife International (2022) Handbook of the Birds of the World and BirdLife International digital checklist of the birds of the world. Version 7. Available at: http://datazone.birdlife.org/userfiles/file/Species/Taxonomy/HBW-BirdLife_Checklist_v7_Dec22.zip

Recommended Citation

External Links


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