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As I sit listening to the melodic chatter of the parrotlets, I am struck by the song of one individual in particular. The louder sound, deeper tones and a wider range of notes leave me feeling both happy and sad at the same time. Happy, because I know that I am one of the few people in the world privileged enough to be listening to the calls of our male Yellow Face parrotlet (Forpus xanthops), Henry. Sad, because his calls are in vain; there is no female in which to answer. In an aviary full of parrotlets, he is alone. Believed
to be the rarest species of Forpus
parrotlets, they are only found in the remote Maranon Valley in northwestern
Peru. Due to the inaccessibility of
this area, very little is known of their habits in the wild.
No records have been made of their numbers but they are believed to be
small due to their extremely limited range.
No subspecies have ever been identified. They are listed in CITES
on Appendix II. At
six inches in length and weighing more than fifty grams, they are also the
largest species of Forpus parrotlets. As
in male Pacifics, male Yellow Face have both a streak of cobalt-blue feathers
extending behind the eye as well as cobalt-blue on the rump and wings.
Both males and females have horn-colored legs and beaks.
The beak also has a black stripe that runs down the middle from the cere
to the tip. As the name suggests,
they have beautiful yellow feathers around the face from the crown of the head
to the bottom of their necks. The
females look similar to the males but their lower backs and rumps are pale blue
rather than cobalt. They also have
green feathers tinged with blue on their wings.
Some female Pacifics also have blue feathers on the rump but no other Forpus
hen has blue on the wings. Sometime
in the early 1980s, between ten and twenty pair of Yellow Face were imported
into the United States. At the time, everyone thought there was an inexhaustible
supply of birds and it would never change.
While captive breeding was beginning to explode, it was because of the
money that could be made selling babies not conservation efforts.
After all, during this time it was possible to import Black
Palm Cockatoos, so who cared about a tiny little parrot no one had ever heard
about. As with happened with tens of thousands of exotic birds in this country,
no one kept track of the Yellow Face and they literally faded into oblivion. At
this time, there are four birds in this country which have been confirmed as
Yellow Face parrotlets. Unfortunately,
they are all males. The last known
female died in a fire with her mate in an aviary in Florida while on eggs. Our Henry is a domestically-raised
Yellow Face. While his history is
sketchy at best, he is a proven male who lost his hen years ago.
Although I have heard of Pacific males that have produced babies at
eighteen, Henry is twelve and not getting any younger.
Every day he sits in his cage alone, is a day that has been wasted.
The sad part is, it does not have to be. Breeders
in Europe, particularly in Belgium, Holland and Germany, have been successfully
breeding Yellow Face for many years. These
breeders are also producing another rare species, Sclaters', as well as several
subspecies of Green Rumps, Spectacles and Blue Wings, all of which are
unavailable in this country. They
have also established several beautiful color mutations in various species of Forpus
parrotlets. These
European birds are healthy, genetically-sound and completely captive-raised.
With the passage of the 1992 Exotic Bird Conservation Act, however, they
cannot be legally imported into the United States.
It is ironic that a law designed to protect wild
populations is also being used to restrict access to the real thing that can
save them - captive-bred birds. This policy must be changed or eventually most
of the world's birds will be gone. Through
organizations such as the International Parrotlet
Society and American Federation of
Aviculture, we can have our voices heard.
As responsible aviculturists, we must educate the general public as well
as the government that we are doing something important.
Zoological parks are not equipped to deal with the volume of species and
subspecies of animals that are becoming. I
read that a member of Congress said that since it was impossible to
save all the animal species it should be decided which ones should be saved and
which ones should become extinct.
Personally, I have no desire to see the government start playing God.
I may not be able to save all the animals but I will do everything in my
power to make sure Forpus
parrotlets are still in the world for future generations.
After all, I owe it to Henry.
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