The chestnut-fronted macaw or severe macaw (''Ara severus'') is one of the largest of the

mini-macaw Mini-macaws are a loosely defined group of small-to-medium-sized macaw species within the Tribe (biology), tribe Arini (tribe), Arini. The term has no fixed taxonomic meaning and is principally used in aviculture to describe a small macaw belonging ...

s. It reaches a size of around of which around half is the length of the tail. They can be found over a large part of Northern

South America South America is a continent entirely in the Western Hemisphere and mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere at the northern tip of the continent. It can also be described as the sout ...

from

Panama Panama ( , ; es, link=no, Panamá ), officially the Republic of Panama ( es, República de Panamá), is a transcontinental country spanning the southern part of North America and the northern part of South America. It is bordered by Co ...

south into Amazonian

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

and central Bolivia. A feral population is found in

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. Their lifespan is listed as anything from 30 to 80 years of age.

Taxonomy

The chestnut-fronted macaw was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist

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

in the tenth edition of his '' Systema Naturae''. He placed it with all the other parrots in the

genus Genus ( plural genera ) is a taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms as well as viruses. In the hierarchy of biological classification, genus comes above species and below family. In binomial nom ...

Psittacus ''Psittacus'' is a genus of African grey parrots in the subfamily Psittacinae. It contains the two species: the grey parrot (''Psittacus erithacus'') and the Timneh parrot (''Psittacus timneh''). For many years, the grey parrot and Timneh p ...

'' and coined the binomial name ''Psittacus severus''. This macaw is now one of the eight extant species placed the genus ''

Ara ARA may refer to: Media and the arts * American-Romanian Academy of Arts and Sciences * '' Artistička Radna Akcija'', compilation album released in former Yugoslavia * Associate of the Royal Academy, denoting membership in the British Royal Aca ...

'' that was erected in 1799 by the French naturalist Bernard Germain de Lacépède. The genus name is from ''ará'' meaning "macaw" in the

Tupi language Old Tupi, Ancient Tupi or Classical Tupi (also spelled as Tupí) is an extinct Tupian language which was spoken by the aboriginal Tupi people of Brazil, mostly those who inhabited coastal regions in South and Southeast Brazil. It belongs to ...

of Brazil. The word is an

onomatopoeia Onomatopoeia is the process of creating a word that phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes. Such a word itself is also called an onomatopoeia. Common onomatopoeias include animal noises such as ''oink'', '' ...

based on the sound of their call. The specific epithet ''severus'' 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 ...

meaning "grim", "cruel" or "stern". The species is considered to be

monotypic In biology, a monotypic taxon is a taxonomic group (taxon) that contains only one immediately subordinate taxon. A monotypic species is one that does not include subspecies or smaller, infraspecific taxa. In the case of genera, the term "unispe ...

: no subspecies are recognised.

Description

The chestnut-fronted or severe macaw is mostly green in colour with patches of red and blue on the wings. The head has a chestnut brown patch just above the beak. The beak is black and the patches around the eyes are white with lines of small black feathers. It is the only one of the miniature macaws that has lines of feathers in the bare patches around its eyes. In the wild their typically gregarious personality can become more aggressive at puberty giving them the name Severe. This tendency can be curbed in captivity but the species requires significant handling to make a tame pet. It is long and weighs .

Breeding

The chestnut-fronted macaw

nest A nest is a structure built for certain animals to hold eggs or young. Although nests are most closely associated with birds, members of all classes of vertebrates and some invertebrates construct nests. They may be composed of organic materi ...

in a hole in a tree. The eggs are white and there are usually two or three in a clutch. The female incubates the eggs for about 28 days, and the chicks fledge from the nest about 70 days after hatching.

Gallery

DiegoAzalea1280.jpg, A pet parrot Chestnut-fronted macaw.jpg, near Wild Sumaco Lodge, Ecuador Ara severus MHNT.ZOO.2010.11.148.9.jpg, ''Ara severus'' - MHNT

References

Ecuador Ecuador ( ; ; Quechua: ''Ikwayur''; Shuar: ''Ecuador'' or ''Ekuatur''), officially the Republic of Ecuador ( es, República del Ecuador, which literally translates as "Republic of the Equator"; Quechua: ''Ikwadur Ripuwlika''; Shuar: ' ...

, Guyana,

Peru , image_flag = Flag of Peru.svg , image_coat = Escudo nacional del Perú.svg , other_symbol = Great Seal of the State , other_symbol_type = National seal , national_motto = "Firm and Happy f ...

, Suriname) with (inaccurate)-RangeMap
Chestnut-fronted Macaw - Wild Perched Pair (medium res photo)
an

a
Pinkmoose BirdingChestnut-fronted Macaw (high res photo)
a
Bird Watcher's Digest

at ttp://www.birdlife.org/index.html BirdLife International {{Taxonbar, from=Q852709 chestnut-fronted macaw chestnut-fronted macaw Birds of Colombia Birds of Venezuela Birds of Ecuador Birds of the Amazon Basin Birds of the Guianas chestnut-fronted macaw chestnut-fronted macaw Birds of Brazil

Taxonomy

Description

Breeding

Gallery

References

External links