Malay Parakeet

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Malay Parakeet
Painted Parakeet in human care

Painted Parakeet in human care

Systematics
Class : Birds (aves)
Order : Parrots (Psittaciformes)
Family : True parrots (Psittacidae)
Tribe : Flat-tailed Parakeets (Platycercini)
Genre : Running parakeets ( Cyanoramphus )
Type : Malay Parakeet
Scientific name
Cyanoramphus malherbi
Souancé , 1857

The Malherbe Parakeet ( Cyanoramphus malherbi ), also known as the Alpine Parakeet , is a rare species of parrot from the genus of the parakeet ( Cyanoramphus ). It occurs on the South Island of New Zealand and some coastal islands. The type epithet honors the French naturalist Alfred Malherbe (1804–1866).

features

At 20 cm, the Malay Parakeet is the smallest type of parakeet. It looks very much like the jumping parakeet. However, the adult birds have an orange-colored headband (not a purple-red like the jumping parakeet), which becomes lighter towards the eyes. The top of the head is light yellow. Each side of the rump is marked with an orange spot. The outer flags of the hand and arm wings are purple-blue. The beak is gray with a dark gray tip. The iris is orange-red, the legs are brown. The wing length is 95 to 114 mm in the males. The juvenile birds look similar to the adult birds. Their headband is more indistinct and lighter, the tail is shorter and the iris is light brown.

distribution and habitat

From the mainland, the Malay Parakeet is known from three valleys on New Zealand's South Island that only support small breeding populations. These are the South Branch Hurunui River Valley, the Hawdon River Valley, and the Poulter Valley in the North Canterbury region . Unique sightings are from the northern foothills of the Hurunui River Valley (2004–2005), the Andrews Valley (2007) and the Eglington Valley (1990–1991) in the Southland region. The habitat are pseudo-beech forests ( Nothofagus fusca and Nothofagus solandri ) at altitudes between 600 and 900 m. An old tree population with sufficient natural caves or cavities is necessary for nesting.

Existence and endangerment

The Painted Parakeet used to be native to the forests and subalpine scrubland of the North and South Islands of New Zealand. Due to the disappearance of the old forests, the destruction of the habitat by cattle, deer and opossum, as well as being stalked by predators such as ermines , the species became increasingly rare. In the 1990s, a population of 500 to 700 specimens was assumed. This population was decimated to 100 to 200 specimens in the summers of 1999 and 2000 by a plague of rats. In order to save the Malay Parakeet from extinction, a resettlement project was started on the rat-free island of Chalky Island from 2005 , where the parakeets successfully brooded. In 2009 the population on Chalky Island was estimated at over 150 and in early 2011 at 100 to 200 individuals. Recently, however, there has been an apparent decline in the Chalky Island population with a simultaneous increase in the jumping parakeet population on the island. In April 2012, it was estimated that around 50 adult Males Parakeet survived on Chalky Island. In 2007 Malay Parakeets were relocated to Maud Island , where they also breeded successfully. In 2009 the population there was estimated at 50 individuals and at the beginning of 2011 at 60 to 100. At the beginning of 2012, however, a population of 50 or at least 30 adult birds was assumed. Since December 2009 a resettlement project has been running on Mayor Island (Tuhua) off the coast of the North Island . 63 birds were brought to the island, which successfully brooded in the spring of 2011 and 2012, so that the population is currently estimated at over 100 individuals. Another relocation project took place on Blumine Island in the Marlborough Sounds , where 51 birds were moved in 2011/2012. In 2015, 23 specimens were released into the wild on the Hurunui River in the Canterbury region of New Zealand's South Island . The mainland population was estimated at 165 to 300 specimens at the beginning of 2011, the island populations at 223 to 363. However, precise population surveys are prevented because it is very difficult to distinguish the Malayed Parakeet from the Spring Parakeet. BirdLife International classifies the Painted Parakeet in the critically endangered category .

Systematics

The Malherbe Parakeet was described as an independent species by Charles de Souancé in 1857 . In the following period, however, the species status was controversial. In 1974, the ornithologist put David Thomas Holyoak on the presumption that it is in Malherbe's Parakeet is a color morph of the Spring parakeet ( Cyanoramphus auriceps could act), which was confirmed in 1986 by RH Taylor by crosses between the two taxa. In 2000, the molecular biologists Jonathan C. Kearvell, Wee Ming Boon, Charles H. Daugherty and Geoffrey K. Chambers were able to show that Cyanoramphus malherbi is an independent species using a mitochondrial DNA sequence analysis . Although both taxa are very similar in their morphology, the beak of the male Males Parakeet is significantly shorter than that of the Spring Parakeet.

literature

  • Joseph M. Forshaw: Parrots of the World: An Identification Guide . Princeton University Press, Princeton, New Jersey, and Woodstock, United Kingdom, 2006. ISBN 978-0-691-09251-5
  • Del Hoyo, J., Elliot, A. & Sargatal, J. (Editors) (1997). Handbook of the Birds of the World. Volume 4: Sandgrouse to Cuckoos . Lynx Edicions. ISBN 8487334229

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Souancé, ch. De. 1857. Descriptions de trois nouvelle espèces de Perroquets. Revue et magazin de zoologie mars 1857: p. 97-98
  2. ↑ Holyoak, DT 1974. Cyanoramphus malherbi, is it a color morph of C. auriceps? In: Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club 94: p. 4-9.
  3. ↑ Taylor, RH; Heatherbell, EG; Heatherbell, EM 1986. The orange-fronted parakeet (Cyanoramphus malherbi) is a color morph of the yellow-crowned parakeet (C. auriceps). Notornis 33: p. 17-22.
  4. ↑ Boon, WM; Kearvell, JC; Daugherty, CH; Chambers, GK (2000). Molecular systematics of New Zealand parakeets: Conservation of orange-fronted and Forbes' parakeets. In: Bird Conservation International 10: p. 211-239.