The orange-winged amazon (Amazona amazonica), also known as orange-winged parrot and loro guaro, is a large amazon parrot. It is a resident breeding bird in tropical South America, from Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago south to Peru, Bolivia and central Brazil. Its habitat is forest and semi-open country. Although common, it is persecuted as an agricultural pest and by capture for the pet trade (over 66,000 captured from 1981 to 1985). It is also hunted as a food source. Introduced breeding populations have been reported in Puerto Rico and Tenerife in the Canary Islands. Linnaeus cited the 1760 description by the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson. Brisson used the French name "Le Perroquet Amazone" and the Latin name later used by Linnaeus, Psittacus amazonicus. Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. The orange-winged amazon is now one of around 30 species placed in the genus Amazona that was introduced by the French naturalist René Lesson in 1830. The species is considered to be monotypic: no subspecies are recognised. including the fruit of palm trees and sometimes cocoa, mangoes, and oranges.

The orange-winged amazon has been introduced to Tenerife in the Canary Islands, where it has been observed successfully hybridizing with a feral scaly-headed parrot (Pionus maximiliani) and also attempting to breed with feral monk parakeet (Myiopsitta monachus) and rose-ringed parakeet (Psittacula krameri), even involving itself in the former species' unusual nest-building behaviour.

References

Further reading

  • Birds of Venezuela by Hilty, .
  • "National Geographic" Field Guide to the Birds of North America .
  • Handbook of the Birds of the World Vol 4, Josep del Hoyo editor, .
  • "National Audubon Society" The Sibley Guide to Birds, by David Allen Sibley, .
  • "Amazon Parrots" - Faze magazine