Puerto Rican Parrots Sighted in Río Abajo State Forest

Puerto Rican Parrot (Amazona vittata), Río Abajo State Forest. Photo courtesy of Ricardo M. Rodríguez.The Puerto Rican Parrot (Amazona vittata) or “Iguaca”, as it was known by the indigenous Taínos, is a bright green-feathered bird, with a red forehead, white rings round the eyes, and blue primary flight feathers. The young look very similar to the adult parrots; females and males also look alike, and they measure approximately 12 inches.

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PR parrot recovery gets new lift

The Puerto Rican parrot, Amazona vittata, was once abundant in Puerto RicoFederal and local agencies are sticking solidly behind a program to boost the population of endangered Puerto Rican parrots.

The Puerto Rican parrot, Amazona vittata, was once abundant in Puerto Rico, including the islands of Culebra, Vieques and Mona. This parrot is now one of the most endangered birds in the world and the last species of psittacine extant and native to the United States.

In pre-colonial times, there were an estimated 1 million of the birds spread across Puerto Rico. Intensive agriculture, particularly the massive clearing of forests for sugar cane, coffee and citrus, and a series of devastating hurricanes destroyed most of their prime habitat. By the late 1960s, they had disappeared from the entire island, except a few dozen in El Yunque, a mountainous tropical rain forest east of San Juan. In 1975, a census found just 13 birds left in the wild.

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Partnering for Parrots

An endangered Puerto Rican parrot. Photo Credit: Pablo Torres, USFWSThe Puerto Rican parrot (Amazona vittata) is the last remaining native psittacine in United States territory, and the rarest and most endangered of the 34 species of Amazon parrots. First declared an endangered species in 1967, an intensive and ongoing recovery program for the parrot was initiated in the Luquillo Mountains, also known as the El Yunque National Forest, in 1968. Early recovery efforts focused on acquiring basic natural history data, as well as improving what was quickly discovered to be a very low nesting success rate. Then in 1973, a captive-rearing component was added to the recovery program in an effort to increase overall productivity, provide a safe haven for sick or injured wild parrot nestlings, and provide parrots for release back into wild. This aviary for raising parrots was established at an abandoned military outpost within the El Yunque National Forest.

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Axeq Technologies and the University of Puerto Rico, Collaborate with the National Cancer Institute to Produce the First Draft Sequence of a Critically Endangered Parrot Species

Puerto Rican Amazon. Image by U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Southeast RegionROCKVILLE, (BUSINESS WIRE) -- Axeq Technologies announced the completion of a draft sequence of the Puerto Rican parrot genome (Amazona vittata) in collaboration with investigators from multiple institutions including the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, and the National Cancer Institute. The project marks a milestone in the understanding of the genome of this critically endangered bird. This is also the first parrot of the large genus Amazona to be sequenced. The sequencing data represents about 42.5 billion nucleotide bases, which is equivalent to an average coverage of 26.89X. The funding of the project is made possible through an international collaboration supported by the donations from the people of Puerto Rico.

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Endangered Puerto Rican Parrot on the Rise

Photo by Tom MacKenzie, USFWS - Puerto Rican parrot pictured inside a fly cage at El Yunque National Forest protected habitat in Luquillo, Puerto Rico. The parrots are one of about 34 Amazon parrots' species found in the Americas. They are known for the bright red shock of feathers at their forehead, white rings around their eyes and the shimmering blue feathers under their wings. The Puerto Rican parrot has hovered at the edge of extinction for decades but is now making a bit of a comeback.

Deep amid the dense greenery of a rain forest, down an unmarked road, behind a barbed wire fence in a low-slung compound monitored by security cameras, government scientists are nursing a special patient back to health.

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