English             -            Green-winged Macaw

Portuguese     -             Arara-vermelha-grande

Latin                -              Ara chloropterus          

The Green-winged Macaw, also known as the Red and Green Macaw is one of the largest Macaw of the Ara genus family.                   

The Green-winged Macaw  is a large, mostly red parrot with a long tail, conspicuous green upper wing coverts, and a large bill. It is most easily distinguished from the largely sympatric Scarlet Macaw by the fact that it has green upper wing coverts (bright yellow in Scarlet Macaw, although immature Green-winged Macaws may show some yellowish green), red feathered lines on the twin white face patches, and are slightly larger size. The beak is strongly hooked and built to crush or open even the hardest nuts and seeds. Its legs are dark grey and their feet are zygodactylous. The Green-winged Macaw can get to 90cm in length with a wingspans of up to 122 cm.  They weigh around 1.7kgs. Like all other Macaws they are monomorphic. Their calls include different vocalisations, such as shrieking, or yelping and cawing sounds.            

The Green-winged Macaw can be found in eastern Panama through Colombia and from Venezuela east to Brazil and south to Paraguay and Bolivia. They are found in tropical rainforests, along lowlands and the lower foothills of interior regions, mostly avoiding coastal areas.

The diet of the Green-winged Macaw include nuts, fruit, berries, seeds and some vegetable matter foraged from trees constitute the typical diet of these macaws in the wild. They are able to eat some poisonous fruits due to their habit of eating river clay, which appears to neutralise the toxins.    

Green-Winged Macaws reach maturity when they are about 2 to 3 years old. They display courtship rituals to indicate they have found a suitable mate; they are generally monogamous. However, they may replace a mate that they have lost. They breed every 1 to 2 years. In their natural habitat, they nest in the hollow trunks of dead palm trees or cavities (natural or excavated by other birds) in tall trees high up to avoid predation. The female will lay 1-3 eggs and are incubated for 25-28 days.   The hatchlings are blind, featherless and completely dependent on parental care at birth. For the first week, the female alone feeds the young through regurgitation and after that time, the male will usually assist. The first down feathers appear around 8 days after hatching and the first pin feathers emerge after 3 weeks. The chicks open their eyes at around 15 days. Both parents are very protective of their young and aggressively defend them against intruders. The young fledge the nest when they are about 90 days old and are independent at about 20 weeks. 

The Green-winged Macaw currently is not classified as endangered.  However, they have disappeared from part of their former range in Panama and are extinct in some parts of its range including Argentina. Largely a forest dwelling species, Green-winged Macaws are under pressure from deforestation and human population growth.  They are also a popular species in the pet trade, going easily for as much as US$1500 each. According to the IUCN Red List, the global population size of the Green-winged macaw has not been quantified, but it is believed to be large and is described as ‘frequent’ in at least parts of its range.  Global population trends have not been quantified, there is evidence of a population decline, but the species is not believed to approach the thresholds for the population decline criterion of the IUCN Red List (i.e. declining more than 30% in ten years or three generations).  For these reasons, the Green-winged Macaw is classified as a species “of Least Concern”.

Photos of the Green-winged Macaws were taken at Parque das Aves - Foz do Iguacu - Parana.