Yellow-crowned parakeet

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Yellow-crowned parakeet
Kakaariki.jpg
In captivity
CITES Appendix II (CITES) [2]
Scientific classification OOjs UI icon edit-ltr.svg
Domain: Eukaryota
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Clade: Dinosauria
Class: Aves
Order: Psittaciformes
Family: Psittaculidae
Genus: Cyanoramphus
Species:
C. auriceps
Binomial name
Cyanoramphus auriceps
(Kuhl, 1820)

The yellow-crowned parakeet (Cyanoramphus auriceps) also known as the yellow-fronted parakeet is a species of parakeet endemic to the islands of New Zealand. The species is found across the main three islands of New Zealand, North Island, South Island and Stewart Island/Rakiura, as well as on the subantarctic Auckland Islands. It has declined due to predation from introduced species such as stoats, although unlike the red-crowned parakeet, it has not been extirpated from the mainland of New Zealand. Its Māori name is kākāriki.

Contents

History

The yellow-crowned parakeet was once widely distributed across all of New Zealand, both the main islands and the outlying ones. However, due to both the aforementioned introduced mammals and human destruction of habitat, these parakeets have become much scarcer in the last few decades. While uncommon, they are still the most common parakeet in New Zealand.

Taxonomy

This species was first described by Heinrich Kuhl in 1820 and originally named Psittacus auriceps. [3]

Description

Yellow-crowned parakeet near Lake Matheson, New Zealand Yellow-crowned Parakeet.jpg
Yellow-crowned parakeet near Lake Matheson, New Zealand

Yellow-crowned parakeets are 23 cm long and primarily bright green. They have a red band fronting their eponymous golden crown. Their wings, when spread in flight, are bluish purple. Their eyes are either orange or red and their bill is grey.

The males of this species are larger than the females. The females can also be distinguished from males as their bills are disproportionally smaller. [4]

Range and habitat

Yellow-crowned parakeets prefer the upper canopies of tall, unbroken stub and forest, though they have been observed at high-altitude tussock meadows and on some of the subantarctic islands. A notably favoured habitat is mixed podocarp/nothofagus forest. [5] The preference of C. auriceps for the upper canopies may have placed it at an advantage in comparison to the red-crowned parakeet, as it likely reduced the risk from predators. [6]

These parakeets are endemic to New Zealand and range across the main islands, as well as Ewing Island in the Auckland Islands. This is the world's most southern observed location of Cyanoramphus , and the second-southernmost location of living parrots. [5]

Diet

Yellow-crowned parakeets subsist on the seeds of beech, flax, and tussock, but also eat fruits, flowers, leaves, shoots, and invertebrates. [5]

Reproduction

These birds build nests in crevices, burrows, and trunks of trees depending on the habitat. Their eggs are white. [5]

Conservation

The yellow-crowned parakeet is absolutely protected under New Zealand's Wildlife Act 1953. [7] The species is also listed under Appendix II of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) meaning international export/import (including parts and derivatives) is regulated. [8]

Related Research Articles

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A broad-tailed parrot is any of about 35–40 species belonging to the tribe Platycercini. The members of the tribe are small to medium in size, and all are native to Australasia, Australia in particular, but also New Zealand, New Caledonia, and nearby islands.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kākāriki</span> Common name for three species of parakeets

The three species of kākāriki, or New Zealand parakeets, are the most common species of parakeets in the genus Cyanoramphus, family Psittaculidae. The birds' Māori name, which is the most commonly used, means "small parrot". The etymology is: from kākā, parrot + riki, small. The word is also used to refer to the colour green because of the birds' predominantly green plumage. The patches of red on the birds' rumps are, according to legend, the blood of the demigod Tāwhaki.

<i>Cyanoramphus</i> Genus of birds

Cyanoramphus is a genus of parakeets native to New Zealand and islands of the southern Pacific Ocean. The New Zealand species are often called kākāriki. They are small to medium-sized parakeets with long tails and predominantly green plumage. Most species are forest dwellers, although several of the subantarctic species live in open grassland. The genus formerly had a widely disjunct distribution: while most of the genus ranged from New Caledonia to Macquarie Island, two species were found in the Society Islands, 4,100 km (2,500 mi) away from the rest. Although the islands between these two areas have yielded many bird fossils, undescribed extinct Cyanoramphus have not yet been found on any of them.

<i>Cyanoramphus malherbi</i> Species of New Zealand bird

Cyanoramphus malherbi is a small parrot endemic to New Zealand, where it is known as the orange-fronted parakeet or orange-fronted kākāriki. In the rest of the world it is called Malherbe's parakeet, as when it was recognised as a species, the name "orange-fronted parakeet" was already used for Eupsittula canicularis, a Central American species. Restricted to a few valleys in the South Island and four offshore islands, its population declined to around 200 in the 1990s, and it is considered critically endangered.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Antipodes Subantarctic Islands tundra</span> Ecoregion

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ewing Island (New Zealand)</span> Island of the Auckland group in the subantarctic South Pacific

Ewing Island is an uninhabited island, part of the Auckland Islands group, a subantarctic chain that forms part of the New Zealand outlying islands. It lies in the north-east of the group, close to the mouth of Port Ross, immediately to the south of the larger Enderby Island and off the north-eastern tip of the main Auckland Island.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Antipodes parakeet</span> Species of bird

The Antipodes parakeet or Antipodes Island parakeet is a parrot in the family Psittaculidae that is endemic to the Antipodes Islands of New Zealand. It is one of two parrot species found on the islands, and one of only five ground-dwelling parrots in the world. They are long-living birds that may live up to 10 years of age, but the introduction of mice that compete with them for food was a threat to their survival on the Antipodes Islands until the mice were successfully eradicated from the Islands in 2016. Unusually for parrots, they sometimes prey upon other birds, a trait shared by another New Zealand parrot, the kea.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Red-crowned parakeet</span> Species of bird

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Raiatea parakeet</span> Extinct bird of the Society Islands

The Raiatea parakeet or Society parakeet, also known as the Society kakariki or brown-headed parakeet, is an extinct parakeet of the genus Cyanoramphus.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Northern rosella</span> Parrot native to northern Australia

The northern rosella, formerly known as Brown's rosella or the smutty rosella, is a species of parrot native to northern Australia, ranging from the Gulf of Carpentaria and Arnhem Land to the Kimberley. It was described by Heinrich Kuhl in 1820, and two subspecies are recognised. The species is unusually coloured for a rosella, with a dark head and neck with pale cheeks—predominantly white in the subspecies from the Northern Territory and blue in the Western Australian subspecies hillii. The northern rosella's mantle and scapulars are black with fine yellow scallops, while its back, rump and underparts are pale yellow with fine black scallops. The long tail is blue-green, and the wings are black and blue-violet. The sexes have similar plumage, while females and younger birds are generally duller with occasional spots of red.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Chatham parakeet</span> Species of bird

The Chatham parakeet, also known as Forbes' parakeet, is a rare parakeet endemic to the Chatham Islands group, New Zealand. This parakeet is one of New Zealand's rarest birds and is classified as Vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, as a result of a range of threats to the species survival, including habitat loss, predation, and hybridization. A number of conservation methods have been employed to assist the recovery of this species, and currently the population trend is considered stable.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Norfolk parakeet</span> Species of bird

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">New Caledonian parakeet</span> Species of bird

The New Caledonian parakeet or New Caledonian red-crowned parakeet, is a species of parrot in the family Psittaculidae. It is endemic to New Caledonia. The species was once considered to be conspecific with the red-fronted parakeet of New Zealand but is now considered a full species and is known to be the basal species in the genus Cyanoramphus, which had its origins in New Caledonia.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Reischek's parakeet</span> Species of bird

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New Zealand is geographically isolated, and originally lacked any mammalian predators, hence parrots evolved to fill habitats from the ground dwelling kākāpō to the alpine dwelling kea as well as a variety of forest species. The arrival of Māori, then European settlers with their attendant animals, habitat destruction and even deliberate targeting, has resulted in their numbers plummeting. Today one species is on the brink of extinction and three other species range from Vulnerable to Critically Endangered, all impacted by invasive species. Further parrot species were not introduced by acclimatisation societies, but occasional releases, both deliberate and accidental, have resulted in self-sustaining populations of some Australian species. New Zealand was identified among the highest priority countries for parrot conservation in the world, due to its parrot diversity, endemism, threats, and having more threatened parrot species than expected.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Southland temperate forests</span> Terrestrial ecoregion in New Zealand

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References

  1. BirdLife International (2016). "Cyanoramphus auriceps". IUCN Red List of Threatened Species . 2016: e.T22685175A93061596. doi: 10.2305/IUCN.UK.2016-3.RLTS.T22685175A93061596.en . Retrieved 12 November 2021.
  2. "Appendices | CITES". cites.org. Retrieved 2022-01-14.
  3. Kuhl, Heinrich (1820). Conspectus Psittacorum. Bonn: s.n. p. 46. doi:10.5962/bhl.title.53420 . Retrieved 24 June 2016.
  4. Elliott, Graeme P.; Dilks, Peter J.; O'Donnell, Colin F.J. (January 1996). "The ecology of yellow‐crowned parakeets (Cyanoramphus auriceps) in Nothofagus forest in Fiordland, New Zealand". New Zealand Journal of Zoology. 23 (3): 249–265. doi: 10.1080/03014223.1996.9518084 .
  5. 1 2 3 4 "Yellow-crowned parakeet". www.terranature.org. TerraNature Trust. Retrieved 24 June 2016.
  6. Kearvell, Jonathan C.; Young, James R.; Grant, Andrew D. (2002). "Comparative ecology of sympatric orange-fronted parakeets (Cyanoramphus malherbi) and yellow-crowned parakeets (C. auriceps), South Island, New Zealand" (PDF). New Zealand Journal of Ecology. 26 (2): 139–148. Retrieved 24 June 2016.
  7. "Wildlife Act 1953". New Zealand Legislation. Parliamentary Counsel Office. Retrieved 18 January 2022.
  8. "Appendices | CITES". cites.org. Retrieved 2022-01-14.