Mary Allen
With their bright blue-yellow plumage, Yellow-breasted Macaws are among the most beautiful birds in the tropical rainforest.
Characteristics
What Do Yellow-breasted Macaws Look Like?
Yellow-breasted Macaws are also called Araraunas. They belong to the macaws and are therefore among the largest of all parrots. Yellow-breasted macaws measure 85 centimeters from head to the tip of the tail.
The tail alone, however, makes 50 centimeters. Some animals are even 95 centimeters long. Males and females are about the same size, only the beak and head of the females are slightly smaller. The chest and belly are yellow, the back is bright blue, and the top of the head is green. The face and cheeks are white with a distinctive black stripe pattern. Typical areas for all macaws – the powerful, black beak and the long tail. The feet are colored dark gray.
Where do Yellow-breasted Macaws live?
Yellow-breasted Macaws live primarily in the Amazon region of South America. There they occur from eastern Panama through Colombia and Ecuador to Argentina and from Venezuela through Guiana to southern Brazil. Like all macaws, yellow-breasted macaws are primarily forest dwellers. They live in the treetops of the jungle trees, where they cleverly use their beak as a climbing aid. Mostly they stay near rivers, sometimes also in savannas.
What types of parrots are there?
There are 26 different parrot species in Central and South America. In addition to the Yellow-breasted Macaw, these include the Cuban Macaw, the Scarlet Macaw, the Green-winged Macaw, the Green Macaw, the Blue Macaw, and the Hyacinth Macaw. There are 300 different species of parrots worldwide. They form a very old bird family and are at home in the tropical regions of the world in Central and South America, Africa, Asia, Australia, and New Zealand.
How old do Yellow-breasted Macaws get?
Macaws and parrots can get very, very old: they live about 50 years on average. However, some animals live to be 100 or even 120 years old.
Behave
How do yellow-breasted macaws live?
In addition to the brightly colored plumage, their strong, hook-shaped beak is also typical of all macaws: It is their primary tool, serving as a “third foot” for climbing, opening nuts and seeds, and holding food. To crack the shells of very hard nuts, the animals first file them thin in one place with the help of their beaks and then break them open.
Because macaws and parrots have such beautiful, long, colorful feathers, they were already popular with the natives of South America: their feathers were used as magnificent headdresses and adornments for clothing. Macaws are very likable birds: not only are they intelligent, but they can also become quite tame.
They are also adept at mimicking many sounds and also human speech. They usually live in larger swarms, migrate through the treetops of the rainforest in search of food and also spend the night together in the trees.
Friends and foes of the Yellow-breasted Macaws
The greatest enemy of the macaws is man: in the past, the birds were mainly hunted for their feathers, today many young birds are poached and sold as pets.
How Do Yellow-breasted Macaws Reproduce?
Depending on which region they live in, Blue-breasted Macaws breed between December and February; sometimes even until March.
Female Yellow-breasted Macaws lay two to three white eggs, which they incubate for about 25 days. Yellow-breasted Macaws build their nests about 30 meters above the ground in open-topped tree cavities, often in the broken trunks of palm trees. They mostly use caves that have been eaten out by insects. In wet years, the young Blue-breasted Macaws in the open burrows are exposed to heavy tropical rains without protection. Sometimes only one young survives.
Lesser Yellow-breasted Macaws do not leave the nest until they are three months old. Three weeks later they are independent. They only become sexually mature at the age of five to seven years.
How do Yellow and Blue Macaws communicate?
Macaws make screeching calls. They can usually be heard over long distances in the morning and evening. They are also known to be able to mimic sounds in their environment and even words in human speech. However, they are less gifted in languages than, for example, the gray parrots.
Care
What Do Yellow-breasted Macaws Eat?
Macaws are vegetarians. They eat various plants and nuts, which they crack open with their strong beak. They also like seeds, buds, fruits, and berries. And above all, they love the fruits of the Inaja and Tucuma palms.