Macaw

A macaw is a New World parrot. Some of the species are large birds, the largest of the parrots. Macaws are native to Mexico, Central America, South America, and formerly the Caribbean.

Macaws, like all parrots, are unusually intelligent birds. The usual thing for parrots is to pair for life. They stay together even out of the mating season. They often fly in formation, one above the other.

Diet and clay licks

Macaws eat a variety of foods including seeds, nuts, fruits, palm fruits, leaves, flowers, and stems.  Wild species may forage widely, over  for some of the larger species such as Ara araurana (blue & yellow macaw) and Ara ambigua (great green macaw), in search of seasonally available foods.  

In the western Amazon, hundreds of macaws and other parrots descend to exposed river banks to lick clay almost daily,Munn C.A. 1994. Macaws: winged rainbows. National Geographic, 185, 118–140.  except on rainy days.Brightsmith D.J. 2004. Effects of weather on parrot geophagy in Tambopata, Peru. Wilson Bulletin. 116, 134–145. 

It was suggested that parrots and macaws in the Amazon basin eat clay from exposed river banks to neutralize toxins.Gilardi J.D. 1996. Ecology of parrots in the Peruvian Amazon: habitat use, nutrition, and geophagy. Ph.D. dissertation. University of California at Davis, Davis, California 

The clay eating behavior of parrots was studied at clay licks in Peru. Apparently, macaws and other birds and animals prefer clays with higher levels of salt.Powell et al. 2009. Parrots take it with a grain of salt: available sodium content may drive collpa (clay lick) selection in southeastern Peru. Biotropica 41(3):279–282. Sodium is a vital element which is scarce in environments over 100 kilometers from the ocean.On the biogeography of salt limitation 

 Related pages 
Hyacynth macaw
Red-shouldered macaw
Scarlet macaw

 References 

 Other websites 


Category:True parrots

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