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Finsch's Parakeet | Psittacara finschi
Finsch' aratinga | Perico frentirrojo
Finsch's Parakeet is a medium-sized green parakeet with a red forehead and a long, pointed tail. It occurs only from southern Nicaragua to western Panama and in Costa Rica is one of the parakeets most often seen, also in San José and other towns of the Central Valley.
Voice
Loud and shrill; a grating kreek-kreek or kree-ek, rapidly repeated in flight. Groups are usually heard before they are seen.
Recording: Stephan Risch — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
28 cm, with a long, pointed tail. Mostly green, with a red forehead and forecrown; often scattered red feathers on the head and neck. The bend and leading edge of the wing are red, the lesser underwing coverts red and the greater ones yellow, giving a red-and-yellow patch under the wing in flight. The eye is orange with a bare, whitish eye-ring; the bill is horn-coloured. Male and female are alike; young birds have little or no red on the forehead and wing.
Confusion species
The Pacific Parakeet Psittacara strenuus, in Nicaragua, has no red forehead and no red and yellow on the wing. The Olive-throated Parakeet Eupsittula nana is smaller, with an olive-brown throat and breast; the Orange-fronted Parakeet Eupsittula canicularis is smaller, with an orange forehead and a blue crown; the Brown-throated Parakeet Eupsittula pertinax has a brown throat. The Sulphur-winged Parakeet Pyrrhura hoffmanni, in the mountains, is smaller, with a red ear patch and yellow in the wing.
Habitat
Humid lowland and foothill forest, forest edges, secondary forest, coffee plantations, pasture with trees and towns with parks and gardens; from sea level to about 1600 m, sometimes higher. It eats seeds, fruit and flowers, also maize and other crops. It nests in a cavity in a tree or palm.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
From southeastern Nicaragua, mainly on the Caribbean side, through Costa Rica, where it occurs on both slopes and in the Central Valley but is scarce in the dry northwest, to western Panama (Bocas del Toro, Chiriquí and Veraguas). It does not occur outside the guide area.
- Resident
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
In San José and other places in the Central Valley of Costa Rica groups fly over calling loudly in the morning and towards evening, on their way between roosts in parks and feeding trees. In flight the red-and-yellow underwing is easy to see.
Conservation status
Not threatened. Widespread and common in many places; it does well in semi-open, man-made landscapes and in towns.
Scientific name
Psittacara finschi | (Salvin, 1871) (GBIF: Aratinga finschi)
Salvin described the species in 1871 as Conurus finschi; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Psittacara was introduced in 1825 by Vigors. Psittacara joins Greek psittakos 'parrot', Latin psittacus, with the genus name Ara, the macaws. finschi honours the German ornithologist and ethnographer Otto Finsch (1839–1917). The specimen the first description was based on came from Bugaba, Chiriquí, Panama.