Jumping parakeet

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Jumping parakeet
Jumping parakeet (Cyanoramphus auriceps)

Jumping parakeet ( Cyanoramphus auriceps )

Systematics
Class : Birds (aves)
Order : Parrots (Psittaciformes)
Family : True parrots (Psittacidae)
Tribe : Flat-tailed Parakeets (Platycercini)
Genre : Running parakeets ( Cyanoramphus )
Type : Jumping parakeet
Scientific name
Cyanoramphus auriceps
( Kuhl , 1820)

The Spring parakeet ( Cyanoramphus auriceps ) is a New Zealand species from the order of parrots (Psittaciformes). It belongs to the genus of the parakeet ( Cyanoramphus ). The jumping parakeet, known in New Zealand under the name yellow-crowned parakeet , is part of the Antarctic fauna, as it also breeds on two islands in the sub-Antarctic Auckland Islands .

description

Jumping Parakeets look very similar to the related Goat Parakeet ( Cyanoramphus novaezelandiae ), but remain a bit smaller. Female animals caught in the wild reach a size of approx. 23 cm with a weight of 40 g, while males have a size of approx. 25 cm with a weight of 50 g.

The general plumage is dark grass green, pale or slightly yellowish on the underside. A dark purple headband running directly above the nostrils connects the eyes. The upper part of the forehead and the crown is golden yellow. There is a deep yellowish-white spot on the neck, which is normally only visible when the feathers are moved against the grain. There is a noticeable purple-red spot on each side of the rump . The quills are somber blackish and with a pale yellow band on the underside. The outer flags of the thumb wings and the first 4 hand wings and their cover feathers are indigo-blue and narrowly bordered with yellow. The iris is orange-red. The upper bill is bluish-white at the base, black at the tip, and the lower bill completely black. The legs and feet are gray-brown to blackish.

In young animals, the frontal band is more orange and the crown is pale yellow. The plumage lacks the yellowish tinge. Instead, it is a cold, pure green, noticeably paler at the bottom. The red rump spots are smaller and less noticeable and more orange than purple. The beak is horn-colored, the iris brownish. After six to eight months they are fully colored.

Gender differences

The females are very similar to the males, but their red headband is narrower, the yellow apex is less extensive and paler and the beak is smaller. They are easiest to distinguish by the size of their beak. Males are mostly dominant compared to the females and show a powerful, powerful flight of noise, while the females mostly rush through the air almost silently and weightlessly.

Vocalizations

The vocalizations of the jumping parakeets are pleasant, unobtrusive complaining to babbling tones. The distant calls are the loudest utterances and of a uniformly grumbling kind. The close utterances are much quieter and much more varied, are mixed up by the partners alternately and are more reminiscent of a quiet conversation. In courtship, the male uses squeaky rhythmic sounds, strongly rhythmic complaints and voiceless clicks. The male usually also completes his feeding actions for the female with a squeaking sound. Brooding females emit deep, even sounds reminiscent of suffering human moans within the brood cavity when they feel harassed.

distribution

The distribution area of ​​the jumping parakeet extends from the north on the Three Kings Islands over the New Zealand main islands to the Auckland Islands deep in the south. It is currently more common on the main islands than the goat parakeet. There, its current occurrence coincides almost exactly with the remaining occurrences of old, dense, moist forests. The coldest conditions within its range are found in Canterbury and Otago. In Otago, temperatures of −22 ° C were already measured. The most inhospitable weather conditions can be found on the Auckland Islands with rain on 300 days of the year, permanently wet, cold and windy weather with wind speeds of over 60 km / h and maximum summer temperatures typically between 5.5 ° C and 12 ° C.

behavior

Differences to the parakeet

The jumping parakeets are similar in behavior to the goat parakeets and like them are extremely lively. The jumping parakeet differs in some aspects of its behavior from its cousin, the billy parakeet:

  • Sociability: Jumping Parakeets are significantly less sociable than Goat Parakeets and were generally found in pairs in Buller's time, despite their frequent occurrence at the time, while the Goat Parakeets were usually seen in groups of 3 to 12 animals outside of the breeding season.
  • Preferred stay: Jumping parakeets are much more strongly tied to the canopy of old forests than goat parakeets and are accordingly less likely to be seen directly on the ground. So they don't like to be on the ground as much as the goat parakeets.
  • Food: The proportion of animal food is an essential part of the diet of jumping parakeets in the wild and is significantly higher all year round than that of goat parakeets.
  • Sound utterances: Even with the jumping parakeets, the vocalizations are reminiscent of the bleating of goats. However, their utterances are less varied and less loud.

Cognitive behavior

In the field of research on cognitive development in parrots, the jumping parakeet and the African gray parrot are among the pioneering species.

For a long time, the assumptions about the cognitive behavior of parrots and birds in general were shaped instead of facts by variants of the proverbial prejudice “sparrow's brain”, which was little trusted. The first fact-based knowledge of the cognitive performance of parrots came primarily from Irene Pepperberg's work with African gray parrots. The second parrot species - and for a long time essentially remained with these two species - whose cognitive performance has been the subject of serious research was the jumping parakeet (Cyanoramphus auriceps). Mildred Funk took on the jumping parakeets as the first researcher in 1996 to another species of parrots than the African gray parrots and she remained for a long time the only one who researched a species other than the African gray parrots. The jumping parakeet, together with the African gray parrot, is one of the "pioneers" of research into the mental performance of parrots. Intensive research on keas, cockatoos, macaws and others only started relatively recently. It is possible that the apparently curious and eager to experiment behavior of the jumping parakeet was the trigger for M. Funk to use these birds for her research. M. Funk based her research on the children's model of cognitive development by J. Piaget. The ability to solve problems according to the means-to-end theory, object permanence and spatial abilities were tested. The jumping parakeets were not trained for the tasks, so they had to spontaneously find their own individual solutions. Surprisingly, they performed as well in many tests as under two-year-old human children for whom the test series was actually developed.

What was required:

  • Object permanence: skills of searching for e.g. B. hidden things and optical tracking of things that are not directly visible (shell game variants)
  • Means-to-end: functional understanding of causal relationships.
  • The development of operational causality
  • Spatial connections

Way of life and food

The birds live in pairs or in small groups. They stay mainly in the treetops, where they are excellently camouflaged because of their color. On the smaller islands they can also be found in the scrubland, but avoid open landscapes and the ground. Like most parrots, they are likely to have long-term relationships, but even among couples they maintain an unexpected physical distance for parakeets and parrots.

When looking for food, they use their feet in a variety of ways:

  • Loose obstacles on the ground are thrown aside, usually always keeping the target to be exposed in sight
  • Larger parts are unusual for parakeets to feed with the foot to the beak and held.

The food of the jumping parakeet consists of leaves, buds, flowers, shoots, seeds, fruits, berries, nuts and other plant parts, as well as insects, animal remains and on islands they also look for seaweed and mussels from the salt water. The proportion of invertebrates in the diet of jumping parakeets is not insignificant, the preferred food being sought in the trees in the form of scale insects, aphids and leaf miners (larvae). They like to fish freshwater snails and green thread algae from the waters.

status

The jumping parakeet is currently not considered endangered ( WA II Appendix B).

Reproduction

Jumping Parakeets are sexually mature after about five to six months.

Depending on the food available, they are incubated all year round, but the main breeding season is from October to December. They are cave breeders and use hollow branches or tree trunks for breeding, with the female breeding alone. A clutch usually consists of five to nine eggs and the incubation period is 19 days. After around six weeks of nestling , the young birds fly out and continue to be fed for up to three weeks.

Web links

Commons : Jumping Parakeet ( Cyanoramphus auriceps )  - Album with pictures, videos and audio files

literature

  • Walter Lawry Buller : Platycercus Auriceps. - (Yellow-Fronted Parrakeet.) . In: Buller (Ed.): A History of the Birds of New Zealand . London 1888, p. 142-145 (English, nzetc.victoria.ac.nz ).
  • Franz Robiller: Handbook of bird care - parrots . 2nd Edition. tape 2 . Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2001, ISBN 3-8001-7485-5 (first edition 1997).
  • Hadoram Shirihai : A Complete Guide to Antarctic Wildlife . The Birds and Marine Mammals of the Antarctic Continent and Southern Ocean . Alula Press , Degerby 2002, ISBN 951-98947-0-5 (English).
  • Matthias Reinschmidt , Karl-Heinz Lambert: Parrots of the world . Eugen Ulmer, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 978-3-8001-4991-9 .
  • Checklist of the birds of New Zealand, Norfolk and Macquarie Islands and the Ross dependency Antarctica . 4th edition. Te Papa Press , Wellington 2010, ISBN 978-1-877385-59-9 ( nzbirdsonline.org.nz [PDF; 4.3 MB ] first edition 1953).
  • Terry C. Greene : Foraging Ecology of the Red-Crowned Parakeet (Cyanoramphus novaezelandiae) and Yellow-Crowned Parakeet (C. auriceps auriceps) on Little Barrier Island, Hauraki Gulf, New Zealand . In: New Zealand Journal of Ecology . Volume 22 , No. 2 . Christchurch 1998, p. 161–171 ( newzealandecology.org [PDF; 660 kB ]).
  • Mildred S. Funk : Development of object permanence in the New Zealand parakeet (Cyanoramphus auriceps) . In: Animal Learning & Behavior . Volume 24 , No. 4 , 1996, pp. 375-383 ( link.springer.com ).
  • Mildred S. Funk : Problem solving skills in young yellow-crowned parakeets (Cyanoramphus auriceps) . In: Animal Cognition . Volume 5 , No. 3 , 2002, p. 167-176 ( link.springer.com ).
  • Mildred S. Funk , Rana L. Matteson: Stable individual differences on developmental tasks in young yellow-crowned parakeets , Cyanoramphus auriceps . In: Learning & Behavior . Volume 32 , No. 4 , 2004, p. 427-439 ( link.springer.com ).

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Shirihai : A Complete Guide to Antarctic Wildlife . 2002, p.  285 .
  2. ^ Buller : A History of the Birds of New Zealand . 1888, p.  142-145 .
  3. ↑ Checklist of the birds of New Zealand ,… 2010, p.  256-257 .
  4. ^ A b Greene : Foraging Ecology of the Red-Crowned Parakeet ... 1998, p.  168-169 .
  5. ^ Funk : Development of object permanence in the New Zealand parakeet . 1996, p.  375-383 .
  6. ^ Funk : Problem solving skills in young yellow-crowned parakeets . 2002, p.  167-176 .
  7. ^ Funk : Stable individual differences on developmental tasks in young yellow-crowned parakeets . 2004, p.  427-439 .
  8. ^ Greene : Foraging Ecology of the Red-Crowned Parakeet ... 1998, pp.  167 .