Spix’s Macaw: The Race to Save the World’s Rarest Bird

In those times, the complete disappearance of entire species through collecting must have seemed a most unlikely prospect. During this colonial age in which collecting was obsessive, the accumulation of animals would not have seemed very different from amassing, cataloguing and displaying inanimate objects. Today we know better. While our forebears took precautions to safeguard paintings, statues and other works of art for posterity, they could not fully understand the implications of hoarding these precious living creatures.

Even though the individual feathered treasures could not be preserved indefinitely, the rise of zoological gardens contributed to the growing familiarity and popularity of parrots to the point where such birds gradually took on symbolic values. Parrots came to stand for exotic places, tropical forests, colour and intelligence. These aspects of the birds’ appeal was in turn ruthlessly exploited by advertising and marketing executives.

The earliest example of parrots being used for sales purposes was in ancient India where high-class prostitutes carried a parrot on their wrists in order to advertise their profession. In the age of the mass media these birds have reached vast audiences to sell a wide array of products. One television advertisement had an amazon parrot playing the role of a talkative companion to a pirate. This was to sell rumflavoured chocolate.

Other parrots appeared in promotions for fruit drinks and tropical holidays, while a major British food retailer in 2001 adopted the ‘Blue Parrot Café’ brand for a range of children’s foods, featuring a blue macaw chosen for its friendliness and intelligence, and the sharp eyes it would need to select the very best ingredients. Gaudy Scarlet Macaws are the symbol of a Central American airline based in El Salvador: the fact that such birds are now extinct in that country has not deterred the marketing people. For obvious reasons, parrots have also repeatedly featured in promotions for telecommunications and copier products. This promotional use of parrots further elevated their popular familiarity. Inadvertently, it also further stimulated demand for the birds as pets.

Today, a large majority of the world’s different species of parrot are held somewhere in captivity. One estimate is that between 50 and 60 million of them are kept worldwide. Hundreds of parrot, parakeet, cockatoo and macaw clubs and societies exist for enthusiasts. They have hundreds of thousands of members drawn from the many millions who keep parrots of some sort.

The most widespread parrot in captivity today is the humble budgie. These pretty little green parakeets were first brought back from Australia in 1840 by John Gould, and since then have been effectively domesticated. The word budgerigar appears to be derived from the name given to the bird by Australia’s Aboriginal people. Budgies are probably the commonest pets after dogs and cats and have been bred in captivity for hundreds of generations into a variety of colour variants, including white, blue and yellow.

It wasn’t of course simply the convenience of parrots’ ability to tolerate long sea voyages that led to their popularity in captivity. Of the thousands of bird species alive today, it is remarkable how one group, the parrots, has so clearly emerged as being our most popular and valuable feathered companion. Animal traders and pet shops seldom stock seagulls, herons or thrushes; beautiful as these birds are, there is little or no demand for them as pets.

One reason why parrots are so hugely engaging compared with most other birds is that they can manipulate objects. In their natural forest homes, parrots clamber through foliage using their beak like a grappling hook or third foot swinging in all directions to reach the finest fruit, nectar and seed delicacies at the tips of even the thinnest twigs. Once they have procured their favoured feast, they need great dexterity in manipulating tricky food items with their feet, bill and fleshy prehensile tongues.

This acrobatic ability and ‘hand’ to eye coordination makes these birds’ behaviour instantly charming to dextrous humans who can see aspects of themselves in the brightly coloured and inquisitive birds. And, like people, individual parrots show a distinct preference in the use of one or other of their reptile-like feet for manipulating objects. One study of South American Brown-throated Conures (Aratinga pertinax) revealed that about half habitually used their right foot and half the left.

On top of this though, surely the principal reason why we find parrots so irresistible is because of their ability to copy the human voice. From earliest times, the capacity of parrots to ‘talk’ has fascinated us. After thousands of years, it is still their most famed and demanded attribute. The talent for mimicry has impressed people down the ages. Parrots were, for example, allocated roles in various Indian fables and plays. The Hindu sex manual the Kama Sutra sets out no fewer than 64 achievements that a man must strive for – one was to teach a parrot to talk. Four centuries before Christ it was perhaps more surprising for Ctesias’s European readers to learn of a bird that could talk than the mythical one-horned unicorn that he wrote about. His writings in Indica about a Blossom-headed Parakeet (Psittacula roseata) he saw in the East included an account of its abilities in copying the human voice. The bird belonged to an apothecary he had met on his travels, and Ctesias said it ‘could speak an Indian language or Greek, if it had been taught to do so’. Pliny’s description of parrots included the observation that they ‘conducted clear conversations and that, in order to teach them to speak, they must be given a few raps with a small stick on the head, which is as hard as their beak’.

Although in Ancient Rome it was often the responsibility of the household slave to teach the parrot to talk, professional parrot teachers offered a service too. Presumably this skilled job would have been well paid and highly regarded. Certainly the best modern-day animal trainers who teach animals to perform in zoos and for film and television shows can earn a good living. But being trained by a professional teacher to be a good talker didn’t guarantee a long and comfortable life in captivity. The tongues of talking parrots were eaten as a cure for speech impediments.

Later on, parrots like African Greys that could talk very well were revered in Europe. It was believed by the Roman Church that these birds’ ability to speak elevated them in the hierarchy of creation. A parrot belonging to a Venetian Cardinal undoubtedly reinforced this impression; his bird could faultlessly repeat the Lord’s Prayer. Although today we use the phrase ‘parrot fashion’ as a derogatory figure of speech to denote unthinking repetition, modern science has recently suggested that the medieval Church might in fact have had a point. It seems that parrots don’t simply copy: they use words to communicate specific meanings.

One famous African Grey Parrot called Alex has worked for years with American psychologist Irene Pepperberg. Alex has been intensively trained under laboratory conditions to use sounds in relation to their meaning and as a form of communication with people. Alex has demonstrated an ability to use words to describe dozens of objects, colours and materials and uses commands such as ‘come here’ or ‘I want’. Alex has also begun to communicate with words that he has not been taught but overheard and put into the correct context. He also picked up the idea of ‘no’ – a conceptual breakthrough. He would say ‘no’ to his keepers when he wanted to be left alone. Although a long way from being able to hold conversations, Alex does interact with people via human speech.

Pepperberg’s work suggests that parrots, like people, are biologically primed to learn, socialise and communicate. It seems that in common with human children, parrots need to learn from their peers and elders which sounds are significant and worth remembering. The fact that this kind of social learning goes on in the wild is demonstrated by the fact that different flocks of parrots develop their own ‘dialects’. These ‘language’ differences have emerged in studies of geographically isolated populations of parrots and show how their use of sound is not instinctive but learned and cultural. In captivity, where the parrot’s normal feathered companions are instead replaced by human ‘flock members’, the significant sounds are the ones ‘taught’ by people or which seem to elicit a strong response from their human companions. Since the sound of a telephone or the beep of a microwave oven sends the owner (flock member) running to them, these sounds acquire importance and the parrot will therefore reproduce them.11

Alex’s achievements in mastering aspects of human communication are quite staggering. It is worth considering that while parrots have learned our language, we humans have so far failed to communicate with these birds in the whistles, squeaks and squawks that comprise their native tongues. It is also worth dwelling for a moment on the question of who is mimicking whom. The next time a parrot says ‘hello’ and you return the greeting, remind yourself who said it first. There is every impression that some parrots seek attention by talking to people. They use the words that experience has shown them will get a response. The bird says ‘hello’, the human responds. Following this most human-like introduction, the bird acquires the social contact, attention and stimulation it craves. Most people can identify with that.

Despite parrots’ legendary ability to talk, it is remarkable how little is understood of their use of sound in the wild. It was not until 1993, for example, that there was firm evidence of vocal mimicry of wild African Grey Parrots.12 What does seem ever clearer, however, is that their sophisticated use of sounds is more than simply an ability to duplicate. It appears to be a reflection of these birds’ capacity to process and exchange information and is linked to their behavioural and mental flexibility.

One reason parrots need such mental abilities is because, like people, they are social animals. Their brains and instincts are those of creatures that interact at an individual level. Most species live in flocks, at least outside the breeding season. Throughout the year and especially when they are nesting, individual parrots maintain a strong bond with their partner. What goes on in their minds, what emotional dimension there is to the bond between pairs of birds, we can only guess at. Like people, however, it seems that the attachment between a pair goes very deep. Where ‘love’ meets instinct we cannot know, but considering the intelligence of parrots we should not rule out the possibility that an emotional state comparable to that found in humans might bind pairs of these birds together.

Many species pair for life and will only change partners if theirs dies. The pair bond is reinforced by various behaviours including mutual preening and feeding. This aspect of their make-up explains why in most species males and females are similar in size and colour. Sexual dimorphism is most marked in mammals and birds where the males are polygamous and compete with one another for the attentions of several females. In monogamous breeding systems the need to show off with bright plumes and displays is less necessary and for that reason (in the majority of parrots) the sexes look alike. A close bond has great value. Birds that have bred together generally get better at it as time goes by. Rather like first-time human parents, new pairs of parrots can get into difficulties while older and more experienced birds appear to cope much better. Some species might also benefit from a close monogamous relationship in being instantly ready to breed when conditions permit. Many parrots have no defined nesting season and begin their breeding cycle when conditions are suitable; some of the Australian grass parakeets are notable in this respect. The budgerigar for example quickly nests after unpredictable rains, when it lays up to eight eggs. The birds wander in search of areas where rain has fallen and are triggered into breeding condition when such an area is located. The chicks mature fast and leave the nest after only a month. The establishment of a year-round monogamous pair bond is an advantage under these conditions as it saves time when the unpredictable rains fall. The search for a partner and the formalities of courtship are dispensed with and any possible delay in the birds’ ability to make the most of abundant food to feed their chicks is avoided. Again, an advantage that many people will identify with.

Even when the birds are forced to be less sociable and to spread out to take advantage of widely scattered nesting sites or food sources, in most species of parrot the family group forms a tight social unit. When the young fledge from the nest they fly with their parents to learn the feeding techniques and skills of vigilance and predator recognition and avoidance they will need to survive.

In their various levels of social organisation, there are hierarchies, peer groups, families and breeding partners. To cope with such a complex social environment parrots must recognise individuals and know their place in the social order. That in turn requires memory, an ability to learn and to communicate. And such abilities are of premium value to creatures that live a long time. The longer they live, the more they can learn. Longer-lived birds can pass on more information and wisdom to their offspring, thereby improving the young birds’ chances of survival in the unforgiving world of the forest.

Parrots are almost legendary for their longevity. There are many stories of parrots living in excess of 100 years and of birds that have become family heirlooms passed down between generations. Certainly there are birds that have been in families for many years, but the oldest documented birds have not lived beyond their sixties.13 By the time macaws reach their fifties they often have cataracts, arthritis and are approaching senility. Some other birds live for a long time, members of the albatross family for example,14 but the longevity of parrots is quite exceptional nonetheless.

Their human-like traits give parrots a unique personality and character. What other birds have so consistently managed to grab tabloid newspaper headlines? There have been stories of parrots that wolf-whistle at blondes, about a parrot that swore at wild birds when it got stuck up a tree in the garden, the parrot who told the firemen to rescue him before putting the fire out and the ship’s mascot that yelled ‘arse’ and ‘bollocks’ from a cupboard during an important speech by the Admiral and told the rating to ‘fuck off’ when asked to be quiet. There was another story about a parrot that telephoned the police when its owner was locked out.

Tens of millions of years of quite separate evolutionary advance lies between people and parrots. Yet the psychology of these birds and humans has uniquely converged. They are the most human-like of birds, which has made them irresistible to human curiosity. And the appeal seems to go both ways. Not only can parrots build long-term relationships with other parrots, but also with other long-lived sociable creatures – people.

Rosemary Low knows all about that. She has kept parrots for more than forty years. Starting with budgies when she was twelve, Low progressed from there to larger and more demanding species. She has a vast published literature to her name, including a seminal work on the care and breeding of parrots printed in three editions.15 She has looked after some of the world’s largest parrot collections and has an impressive track record of breeding the birds in captivity. In the early 1960s at sixteen, she acquired an African Grey via a friend’s father who was a bank manager in Nigeria. She says it was her first real parrot and gave her many insights into the challenges of keeping the birds in captivity.

Low believes that parrots’ ability to mimic human sounds and to interact emotionally with people has been their downfall.

This is why the African Grey is so popular, but it is a tragedy. They are among the most sensitive birds and there is probably no parrot species less suited to a life in captivity. They have so many behavioural problems when caged. You practically need a degree in psychology to understand grey parrots. They are very clever birds. Like cockatoos they soon learn to manipulate people. The owners can’t cope with them any more so they get passed on from one place to another. It would be like a child finding itself in a new home every eighteen months or so. If it was a person it would be enough for it to end up in a psychiatric hospital.

Captive-bred parrots make better companions but cost at least twice as much. Until very recently there was little interest in breeding the likes of the more common species of amazon parrots, cockatoos or macaws for the pet market because they were so cheap and readily available from the wild. And costs aside, captive breeding is not as straightforward as it sounds.

With the larger and more intelligent parrots in particular, one of the main issues in captive breeding is compatibility. As is the case with humans, it is not sufficient to put a male and female parrot together and expect them to produce and rear young. A pair of birds randomly selected by human keepers can sit together for years and do nothing but, if provided with a partner they like, will nest immediately. Although it can be worth leaving birds together for a period to see if they will finally accept one another, placing parrots with incompatible partners can also lead to stress and emotional damage – something else people can relate to.

The natural commitment to one partner can translate into close relationships with their human keepers and has given pet parrots a reputation for devotion, faithfulness and affection. But the fact that parrots choose who they will or will not bond with can also be a source of disappointment for parrot owners. Having bought a bird, the new keeper can sometimes find that it decides to bond with another member of the human family or a friend. And parrots can also demonstrate fierce jealousy in taking a dislike to individuals whom they regard as competitors for the affections of their ‘partners’. Such selective bonding and expression of choice leads Low to believe that parrots are capable of almost human emotions.

The combination of this human-like emotional sophistication, an instinct for loyalty, the ability to mimic speech – and even to communicate with words – added to their astonishing and vivid beauty, has paradoxically proved a curse to the parrots. The range and depth of their attractions have made some species immensely valuable financially.

A large part of the problem is that parrots are highly collectable. Reminiscent of stamps, antiquarian books and paintings, there are lots of different kinds and several subsets for individual collectors to specialise in. Once the human obsession for rarity is added to the list of attractions in demand, then a lethal combination emerges: not least because one effect of scarcity is to escalate demand. This pushes up prices, leading to more trapping and then more scarcity. This market vortex has sucked down some species to the very brink of extinction.

Although most rare parrots are protected from trade under international law, as well as in most cases national legislation in the countries were they are found, the clandestine traffic in rare birds flourishes. Parrots are today part of an illegal trade in wildlife that ranks second in value only to the multibillion-dollar clandestine drugs and arms markets.

Even though the rarest and most protected kinds must often be kept in secret for fear of detection by the authorities, for the collectors there is still the irresistible allure of possessing birds that other people in your circle do not. The parallels with stolen works of art are surely apposite. The ‘owners’ enjoy the bird’s beauty and uniqueness with the added kick of exclusive control of an object passionately sought and admired by others. The fact that other clandestine collectors know (or believe) that you have it adds further to the attraction. This is a shadowy world of rumour, double-dealing and half-truths.

For some of the leading parrot collectors the challenge of breeding is important. Many also rationalise a conservation motive into their passion for rare birds, and in this respect a minority are sincere. But in the end it is rarity that is the sharpest spur. As in Ancient Rome, parrots are potent symbols of civilisation, wealth and high living; they remain in demand as expensive accessories of rich and powerful men. In this close-knit world, birds like Spix’s Macaws are the epitome of quality and grace; they are in the realm of the true elite.

At this end of the market, large sums of money change hands. Many thousands of dollars are routinely paid for a single rare parrot. But even though the resale value of birds and their offspring can be considerable, for the majority of these specialists cash is not the primary motivation. Some collectors spend fortunes on their parrot-keeping facilities and there is no way they could regain their costs from the sale of birds. A small number are much more businesslike and breed rare parrots on a commercial basis.

And where there is valuable property and jealousy, there is theft. Rare parrots are frequently stolen from their owners. The rarest and most endangered parrots are most at risk. Puerto Rican Parrots (Amazona vittata) are one of the most endangered of all species. Some of these birds are kept in breeding aviaries run by the US Government at the Luquillo National Forest on their native island. In April 2001 bird thieves broke in and took several birds despite the careful attention of the biologists who had been working for decades to save them from extinction.

Until as recently as the late 1980s, the effect of trapping on many of the rare and collectable species in the wild was unknown. The driving force behind the demand for the birds was rarity in captivity. Parrots weren’t considered as real wild birds with natural habitats. So familiar a commodity had they become to the collectors that the idea of them disappearing from their native forests was not seriously considered. Even when the obvious rarity of some parrots was acknowledged and the impact of trapping logically seen as a threat, most enthusiasts denied they were connected to the plight of parrots in the wild. Collectors preferred to blame poor farmers clearing forests or developing-country governments rather than face the consequences of their own obsession.

But by the end of the twentieth century it was clear that many of the main target species taken for the elite collectors’ market were getting into serious trouble. They now comprised some of the rarest and most endangered birds in the world. Many of the worst-affected species occupied tiny ranges in the wild, often only a single small island.

When the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) came into force in 1975 (see page 34), thereby banning trade in some of the most threatened parrots, the smugglers tried every means possible to circumvent the treaty’s protective measures. Rare parrot laundering via countries with more open borders or less strict regulations, document falsification, disguising rare species as common ones and straightforward smuggling all occurred and still do.

Even in countries that had the will to enforce the Convention, the means used by the traders to evade detection grew ever more sophisticated. Parrots are packed inside sections of drainpipe, hidden inside vehicles’ spare tyres and put in plastic bottles to smuggle them past customs officials. Rare parrot eggs are taken on planes strapped against the body of smugglers to keep them warm, hatched in incubators, the babies hand-reared and the birds sold on for a fortune. Where detection of smuggling in some places has improved, the trade routes have shifted to exploit the next weakest point of entry.16

During the second half of the 1980s, the scale of the disaster about to overtake the world’s most familiar and popular birds finally became clear. One man was devoting his working life to the matter: Dr Nigel Collar at the International Council for Bird Preservation (ICBP), a network of bird conservation groups from around the world headquartered at Cambridge in England.17 He had been writing about endangered birds for years and was the world expert on the subject. Collar had accumulated a vast global network of museum curators, academics and ornithologists who helped him piece together a picture of what was happening to the world’s fast-disappearing birds.