Saint Lucia amazon

Saint Lucian Amazona Versicolor
On St Lucia
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Psittaciformes
Superfamily: Psittacoidea
Family: Psittacidae
Subfamily: Arinae
Tribe: Androglossini
Genus: Amazona
Species: A. versicolor
Binomial name
Amazona versicolor
(Müller, 1776)

The Saint Lucia amazon (Amazona versicolor) also known as the Saint Lucia parrot is a species of parrot in the family Psittacidae. It is endemic to Saint Lucia and is the country's national bird.

Its natural habitat is subtropical or tropical moist montane forest. It is threatened by habitat loss. The species had declined from around 1000 birds in the 1950s to 150 birds in the late 1970s. At that point a conservation program began to save the species, which galvanised popular support to save the species, and by 1990 the species had increased to 350 birds.Although the population in Saint Lucia is small it is still expanding.

The story of its salvation from the brink of extinction (including the influence of conservationist Paul Butler) is told in Chapter 7 of the 2010 book "Switch: How to Change Things When Change is Hard" by Chip & Dan Heath.

Identification

The amazon parrot is approximately 43 cm tall. It is an extremely colourful parrot with a blue face and forehead, red area on breast fading to maroon and mottled on lower breast and bell, a red speculum, dark blue primaries, with tail tipped yellow. This the only parrot endemic St Lucia.

Captivity

The St Lucia Amazon parrot is rare in captivity. Not much is known about their breeding requirements. It has been recommended that pairs are isolated in the breeding season because they tend to get aggressive towards other birds during this time. Breeding activities usually start in March and go on until August. The hen lays 1 to 2 eggs which she incubates for 24 days. The young fletch when they are 70 to 77 days old.

References

  1. ↑ BirdLife International (2013). "Amazona versicolor". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Version 2013.2. International Union for Conservation of Nature. Retrieved 26 November 2013.


This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 11/25/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.