The chattering lory (''Lorius garrulus'') is a forest-dwelling parrot endemic to North Maluku,

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

. It is considered vulnerable, the main threat being from trapping for the cage-bird trade. The race ''L. g. flavopalliatus'' is known as the yellow-backed lory.

Taxonomy

The chattering lory was formally described by the Swedish naturalist

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalised binomial nomenclature, the ...

in 1758 in the tenth edition of his ''

Systema Naturae ' (originally in Latin written ' with the ligature æ) is one of the major works of the Swedish botanist, zoologist and physician Carl Linnaeus (1707–1778) and introduced the Linnaean taxonomy. Although the system, now known as binomial nomen ...

'' under the

binomial name In taxonomy, binomial nomenclature ("two-term naming system"), also called nomenclature ("two-name naming system") or binary nomenclature, is a formal system of naming species of living things by giving each a name composed of two parts, bot ...

''Psittacus garrulus''. The specific epithet ''garrulus'' is

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

and means "chattering", "babbling" or "noisy". Linnaeus cited "The Scarlet Lory" that had been described and illustrated in 1751 by the English naturalist George Edwards in his book ''A Natural History of Uncommon Birds''. The specimen had been brought to London from the

East Indies The East Indies (or simply the Indies), is a term used in historical narratives of the Age of Discovery. The Indies refers to various lands in the East or the Eastern hemisphere, particularly the islands and mainlands found in and around t ...

and Edwards was able to make a drawing of the live bird at the home of the Whig politician

Robert Walpole Robert Walpole, 1st Earl of Orford, (26 August 1676 – 18 March 1745; known between 1725 and 1742 as Sir Robert Walpole) was a British statesman and Whig politician who, as First Lord of the Treasury, Chancellor of the Exchequer, and Leader ...

. Linnaeus specied the

locality Locality may refer to: * Locality (association), an association of community regeneration organizations in England * Locality (linguistics) * Locality (settlement) * Suburbs and localities (Australia), in which a locality is a geographic subdivis ...

as "Asia", but this is now taken to be the island of

Halmahera Halmahera, formerly known as Jilolo, Gilolo, or Jailolo, is the largest island in the Maluku Islands. It is part of the North Maluku province of Indonesia, and Sofifi, the capital of the province, is located on the west coast of the island. Hal ...

in the

Maluku Islands The Maluku Islands (; Indonesian: ''Kepulauan Maluku'') or the Moluccas () are an archipelago in the east of Indonesia. Tectonically they are located on the Halmahera Plate within the Molucca Sea Collision Zone. Geographically they are located eas ...

. The chattering lory is now placed in the

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus com ...

Lorius ''Lorius'' is a genus of lory in the parrot family Psittaculidae. The genus contains six species that are distributed from the Moluccas in Indonesia through New Guinea to the Solomon Islands. They have characteristic red plumage with varying am ...

'' that was introduced in 1825 by the Irish zoologist

Nicholas Aylward Vigors Nicholas Aylward Vigors (1785 – 26 October 1840) was an Ireland, Irish zoologist and politician. He popularized the classification of birds on the basis of the quinarian system. Early life Vigors was born at Old Leighlin, County Carlow on 17 ...

. Three

subspecies In biological classification, subspecies is a rank below species, used for populations that live in different areas and vary in size, shape, or other physical characteristics (morphology), but that can successfully interbreed. Not all species ...

are recognised: * ''L. g. flavopalliatus'' Salvadori 1877 – Yellow-backed lory, found on Kasiruta, Bacan, Obi and Mandiole Islands * ''L. g. garrulus ''( Linnaeus, 1758) – nominate, found on

, Widi and Ternate Islands * ''L. g. morotaianus '' (van Bemmel, 1940) – found on

Morotai Morotai Island ( id, Pulau Morotai) is an island in the Halmahera group of eastern Indonesia's Maluku Islands (Moluccas). It is one of Indonesia's northernmost islands. Morotai is a rugged, forested island lying to the north of Halmahera. It ha ...

and Rau Islands

Description

The chattering lory is long. It is mostly red with an all-red head and an orange beak. The eyerings are grey and the irises are orange-red. The wings are mainly green and the angle of the wing is yellow. Its thighs are green. The tail is tipped with dark green. It has dark grey legs. It may or may not have a yellow area on its back depending on the subspecies. File:Yellow-backed Lorikeet (Lorius garrulus) -Kuala Lumpur Bird Park1.jpg, At Kuala Lumpur Bird Park File:Yellow-backed Lorikeet (Lorius garrulus) -Kuala Lumpur Bird Park2a.jpg, Yellow-backed lorikeets File:Chattering-Lory---Lorius-garrulus.jpg, At Jurong Bird Park, Singapore File:Chattering lory (Lorius garrulus) (5).jpg, At

Birdworld Birdworld is the United Kingdom's largest bird park, covering . It is located in the East Hampshire district, close to the village of Bucks Horn Oak and the surrounding Alice Holt Forest. It is part of the parent company Haskins Garden Centre Lt ...

, England File:Chattering_Lory_(Lorius_garrulus)3.jpg

Popular culture

* Since 2019,

YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...

has featured a chattering yellow-backed lory named "Velvet" from his home in

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

. * In May 2021, a chattering lory belonging to former

Capcom is a Japanese video game developer and video game publisher, publisher. It has created a number of List of best-selling video game franchises, multi-million-selling game franchises, with its most commercially successful being ''Resident Evil' ...

sound designer

Hideaki Utsumi , also known as Tono2097, is a Japanese video game sound designer, audio engineer, composer, YouTuber, and musician, and is currently an instructor at HAL Osaka, a vocational school in Osaka, Japan. He is best known for sound design for the ''Re ...

named “Gumi” became an

Internet meme An Internet meme, commonly known simply as a meme ( ), is an idea, behavior, style, or image that is spread via the Internet, often through social media platforms. What is considered a meme may vary across different communities on the Internet ...

, with Utsumi's YouTube channel gaining over 200,000 subscribers by August.

References

External links

BirdLife species factsheet for ''Lorius garrulus''
* * * * *

chattering lory The chattering lory (''Lorius garrulus'') is a forest-dwelling parrot endemic to North Maluku, Indonesia. It is considered vulnerable, the main threat being from trapping for the cage-bird trade. The race ''L. g. flavopalliatus'' is known as the ...

Birds of the Maluku Islands

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