Macaw Compendium

Ara ambigua -
Buffon's Macaw

[ ]
- photo Ingrun Fiedel 		[ ]
- photo Barry Thaxton

Taxonomy:

Psittaciformes / Aratingidae / Aratinginae / Ara / A.ambigua
Subspecies: A.a. ambigua; A.a.guayaquilensis.

Names :

A.a. ambigua                IE: Buffon's Macaw,
                            I   Great Military Macaw
                            IG: Grosser Soldatenara
                            ID: Buffon Ara
                            IF: la grande ara militaire
                            IP: Guacamayo buffon
A.a. guayaquilensis         IE: Ecuadorian Macaw,
                            I   Guayaquil Great Green Macaw
                            I   Chapman's green Macaw
                            IG: Grosser Soldatenara

Distribution:

A.a. ambigua: From NE-Nicaragua to Choco in Mid-Colombia
A.a. guayaquilensis: From W-Ecuador to SW-Colombia

Description:

Length: 85 cm
Plumage general olive-green. Forehead red. Face naked, striped with small feathers, red at the lores, else maroon colored. Flight feathers blue, wing coverts green, greater wing coverts edged with blue. Tail maroon into blue at the tip. Upper tail coverts bluish.
In A.a. guayaquilensis tail feathers are green. Bill black
Legs dark grey
Iris yellowish grey

Habitat:

Lowland tropical rainforest, up to 600 m.

Nutrition:

Seeds, nuts, fruits and berries collected in the treetops.

Breeding:

Start of the season is December in the southern parts of the range, some weeks later in the northern parts. Clutch is up to three eggs, the young fledge at the age of ca. 100 days.

IUCN Red List Status (1994):

not listed

Add. Notes:

In the wild these birds do not gather in great flocks. They occur in small familiy parties up to 5 or 6 birds. Usually they are confined to a single area until all the available food is harvested.
In earlier days these birds were rather common at both sides of the Panama canal, but now they are vanished because of the loss of habitat. Special reports about the conservational programs of Buffon's Macaw in Ecuador and Panama can be found at the pages of the World Parrot Trust (U.S.)

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Created for the Macaw's homepage Feb. 1996
pfeffer@club.tu-clausthal.de