Scarlet macaw

Description

The Scarlet macaw has red plumage on the top part of its body, with yellow and blue back and wings. The tail, longer than the rest of the body, is red. The featherless face is white, the irises are yellow and the beak is two-coloured: the large curved top mandible is white and the bottom one is black.
This is a lowland species that only lives under 1000 metres. They inhabit tropical rainforests, although they can also live in drier and more open wooded habitats and can even live in woods on riverbanks in savannahs that are much more arid.
Their area of distribution stretches from southern Mexico through Central America to Brazil, the Guianas, Colombia, Venezuela, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia, always east of the Andes Mountains.
They tend to live in pairs or small family groups, although in some sites like the clay deposits on the vertical walls of rivers, they can come together in large groups, often mixed with specimens of other parrot species.
They feed on seeds, nuts, fruits, berries and different types of plant matter that they find high in the treetops. They make nests in holes in trees and, more rarely, on platforms dug into the steep banks of rivers.
Like all macaws, their populations are in danger of extinction today, due to the destruction of their forest habitat and excessive capture for the pet trade.