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By MARIANELA JIMENEZ Associated Press Writer
LA GARITA DE ALAJUELA, Costa Rica—Endangered scarlet macaws born in captivity are reproducing in the wild for the first time on Costa Rica’s southern Pacific coast. Read on…
If you use cocaine and need a reason to quit—or one to avoid starting in the first place—think conservation. The national parks of Guatemala and other countries have become the preferred haven of drug traffickers who usurp protected areas and burn the forest to serve their own purposes and the demands of their customers, according to Roan McNab, Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) country director for Guatemala. Read on…
Sharon Matola, the “Zoo Lady” of Belize, is an unlikely environmental hero. A one-time Iowa housewife, she trained in jungle survival with the Air Force, rode freights to Florida to study animal behavior and apprenticed to a Romanian tiger tamer. Later she worked as a circus dancer (with tigers) in Mexico. In the early 1980s, she helped film a nature documentary in Belize. At the end of the shoot, she inherited 20 exotic jungle animals, and the Belize Zoo was born.
A quarter-century later, Matola is a widely respected authority on the scarlet macaw and other tropical species. Her zoo is among the most popular tourist attractions in Belize. And she is successfully restoring harpy eagles and other threatened species to the Belize jungle. Read on…
Thanks to the media attention we received a lot of sightings of the macaws today. Haarlem and surrounding areas are really supporting us and that makes us feel a lot better.
With the help of the reports today we found the older youngster. It is all right and is taken care of by its parents. They have settled near Kenau park. Read on…
After he was set free at the bird sanctuary we have seen the young macaw for two days around the stadskweektuinen in Haarlem. Wednesday afternoon he was very frightened of man in animal ambulance suits. When they arrived the young macaw flew to another higher tree from where it was impossible to reach him with a net.
We have tried to follow the young macaw for as long as possible. It flew from tree to tree and gained more height along the way. Finally it reached the crown of one of the Poplar trees that surround the stadskweektuinen and the nearby public vegetable gardens. At nightfall the macaw flew out of sight and it was impossible to determine where it spend the night. If we did we could possibly have gotten it down with the help of the fire department.
Next day I went out on my bike in the neighbourhood and at noon the young macaw was heard again. He was flying around the stadskweektuinen and was calling out in search of his parents. Although the macaws are regular visitors of this garden they were not the last couple of days. That would have facilitated the reunion of the family a great deal. Read on…
This evening we received a message that one of the young macaws was attacked by a dog and picked up by the Animal Ambulance (Dutch RSPCA) After fledging yesterday morning the young faced a stormy night. The youngest bird probably fell out of a tree. The bird was brought in at the local bird sanctuary. Locally known as Vogel Rampen Fonds. Read on…
Not without pride, with a sigh of relieve and great joy City Parrots can announce that 2 young Scarlet Macaws have fledged. After 23 days in an egg and 3 months in the nest the two youngster fledged early Tuesday morning within an our of each other. Read on…
GUATEMALA CITY (Reuters) - Scarlet macaws threatened by illegal poachers and land invaders who slash and burn their jungle habitat in Guatemala now have scientists watching out for them from space.
Researchers recently fit two of the red, yellow and blue-plumed parrots with satellite collars that send to computers information about their movements through the thick canopy of trees in northern Guatemala and southern Mexico. Read on…
Today we received a wonderful video from Carlos Esteban Lara Vásquez who studies the macaws of Medellin for us. The video was gracefully made available by Carolina Gomez. In the video you can see 5 macaws enjoying some fruit in a tree (Spathodea campanulata) after which they take flight. From the flight pattern you could deduct that their is one pair of Scarlet macaws (Ara macao). These are the birds that fly parallel and synchronised to each other. They are more loosely followed by what might be their offspring. This supports the notion that the macaws have been successfully reproducing within the city habitat. The two other birds are more loosely associated. One of the birds is a green-winged macaw (Ara chloroptera). The first of its kind to be recorded in Medellin!
Araproject has landed in Medellin, Colombia. Where forestry student Carlos Vásquez is presently conducting a pilot study into the Wild parrots of the city.
The local zoo, Zoológico Santa Fe de Medellín, released several macaws in the 80ties when a local law made it illegal for the inhabitants of Colombia to own native species. Overwhelmed by the amount of macaws that were placed in their care they decided to free-range these parrots. They could come and go as they pleased. Food was available for them in aviaries. Read on…
