All species › Parrots › African and New World parrots › Red-and-green Macaw
Red-and-green Macaw | Ara chloropterus
Groenvleugelara | Guacamayo aliverde | Arara-vermelha
The Red-and-green Macaw is the largest red macaw, deep red with a green band across the wing. In the guide area it lives mainly in the Amazonian lowlands east of the Andes. In the morning flocks gather on clay banks along the rivers, where they eat clay.
Voice
Loud, deep, raucous screeches, mainly in flight; slightly lower and less shrill than those of Scarlet Macaw.
Recording: JAYRSON ARAUJO DE OLIVEIRA — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · xeno-canto
Identification
90–95 cm, with a long, pointed tail and a heavy bill with a pale, horn-coloured upper mandible and a black lower mandible. The plumage is deep crimson. The median wing coverts form a broad green band; the flight feathers, lower back and rump are blue. The tail is red with a blue tip. The bare, white face has distinct lines of tiny red feathers. The sexes are alike.
Confusion species
Scarlet Macaw Ara macao is slightly smaller and brighter scarlet, with a yellow instead of green band across the wing, a bare white face without distinct feather lines and a longer tail. In flight the colour of the wing band is the best feature.
Habitat
Tall terra firme forest, flooded forest along rivers, palm swamps and forest islands in savanna, mainly below 500 m, locally to roughly 1000 m in the foothills. It eats fruit, nuts and seeds, and visits clay banks along rivers. It nests in cavities in large trees and locally in cliffs.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of the Andes and the west coast.
Range and movements
In Colombia in the lowlands east of the Andes and locally in the north-west, near the border with Panama. In Ecuador in the Amazonian lowlands, locally. In Peru throughout the Amazonian lowlands. In Bolivia in the northern and eastern lowlands. Absent from the Galápagos. Outside the guide area in eastern Panama, Venezuela, the Guianas, Brazil and Paraguay.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
At the clay licks along the rivers of Madre de Dios in south-eastern Peru, where dozens of macaws gather in the morning. Elsewhere in the Amazonian lowlands from canopy towers.
Conservation status
Least Concern, but locally much reduced by hunting, capture for the cage-bird trade and deforestation, especially along the edges of the range.
Scientific name
Ara chloropterus | Gray, 1859
Gray described the species in 1859 and placed it straight away in the genus where it still stands. The genus Ara was introduced in 1799 by De Lacépède. The genus name comes from Tupi ará, 'macaw', an onomatopoeia of these birds' call. The species name comes from Greek khlōros, 'green', and pteron, 'wing', for the green band on the wing. The specimen the first description was based on came from (per the description).