ENVIRONMENT

Among Puerto Rico’s displaced residents is an entire flock of critically endangered parrots. (Atlas Obscura)

How are conservationists working to support Puerto Rican parrots? Use our activity to learn more about captive breeding.

Teachers, scroll down for a quick list of key resources in our Teachers Toolkit.

Discussion Ideas

• The great Atlas Obscura article describes the Puerto Rican parrot, also called the iguaca, as the island archipelago’s only endemic species. What is an endemic species? It it the same as an indigenous or native species?
  • An endemic species is one that naturally occurs in only one area or region. Iguacas are endemic to the island of Puerto Rico and smaller outlying islands.
    • In another example, the giant panda is endemic to small pockets of forest in central China. It is not naturally found anywhere else on Earth. Take a look at the species range of the giant panda here.
  • Indigenous or native species occur naturally in a specific area, but may also naturally occur in other areas.
    • The grey wolf, for example, is indigenous to northern North America. It is also indigenous throughout northern Eurasia and even the Arabian Peninsula. It is not endemic to one continent, although it is endemic to the Northern Hemisphere. Take a look at the great big species range of the grey wolf here.

• The Atlas Obscura article says that at the time of European contact with Puerto Rico, there were about a million Puerto Rican parrots flying around. How did such a robust population become critically endangered?
  • loss of habitat. According to the good folks at the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, the reduction dates mostly to the 19th century. At that time, developers razed acres of Puerto Rican rain forest for agricultural development. Continued deforestation for industrial development, poaching, competition with introduced species, and natural hazards such as hurricanes reduced the wild population to 22 birds by the late 1980s. Today, that number has increased to about 60 individuals in the wild and about 400 in captivity on the island.

• How did the captive parrots respond to Irma and Maria, the hurricanes that devastated Puerto Rico this year?
  • About 200 iguacas waited out the storm in a concrete “hurricane room” with biologists. According to Atlas Obscura, “[m]ost of the captive parrots were fine, if freaked out. (During the storms themselves, the birds ‘were very quiet, and stopped moving around,’ said parrot biologist Tom White.)”

• How did the wild parrots respond to the hurricanes?
  • That’s the mystery. About half of a flock of wild parrots in El Yunque National Forest are missing.
    • Some birds perished.
      • “[A] few individual birds—which were released earlier this year, and were wearing transmitters—have been tracked down and found dead. The parrots nest in cavities in trees, and Marisel López, supervisor of the Puerto Rican Parrot Recovery Program, thinks they were killed during the first bursts of heavy winds, which came around 2 a.m. ‘They were already asleep,’ she says, ‘and the trees fell down.’
      • Nine birds succumbed to heat and stress after the storms.
    • Many birds survived.
      • The day after Maria, a group of four wild parrots visited the Iguaca Aviary in El Yunque.
      • Spotting the birds has become a citizen science effort: Puerto Ricans have been documenting potential sightings on Facebook. Some confirmed sightings have been miles from the parrots’ forest home, indicating some of the flock may have taken refuge elsewhere.

• Some scientists call long-term parrot conservation efforts a “waiting game.” Why?
  • infrastructure. The iguaca captive-breeding program requires extensive and expensive equipment. Purchasing and installing this equipment is not a priority on the island right now: Puerto Rico’s human population is still grappling with the catastrophic impact of the hurricanes, and time, money—and effort is necessarily prioritizing getting electricity, clean water, and shelter to them. Some of the equipment includes:
    • special cages for parrot procreation
    • incubators to save damaged eggs and house abandoned chicks
    • freezers to keep bird food chilled
    • woodchip sterilizers to make sure nests are disease-free
    • networks of artificial tree cavities so birds can breed in natural habitats after release
    • infrared cameras to document nests
  • nature. The rain forests where the parrots live have suffered immense damage. Until the forests recover—and they will—wild birds do not have adequate shelter or food, and are susceptible to predators such as red-tailed hawks.

TEACHERS TOOLKIT

Atlas Obscura: Among Puerto Rico’s Displaced Residents, an Entire Flock of Endangered Parrots

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service: Puerto Rican Parrot

U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service: Soaring Past Disaster

Nat Geo: Introduction to Captive Breeding