Ill


THE



Hvucultural flfoagastne,


BEING THE JOURNAL OF THE


AVICULTURAL SOCIETY.



New Series— VOL. V. — No. 4.. — All rights reserved. FEBRUARY, 1907.


LEAR'S MACAW.

By the Rev. Hubert D. Astley, F.Z.S., M.B.O.U.


Until I possessed a Lear's Macaw I must confess to not

having appreciated the members of this family overmuch.


I have known individual Blue and Yellow Macaws and Red

and Yellow ones too which were most untrustworthy and spite-

ful, I might say malicious to everyone but their owners, or almost

everyone. And this spitefulness they show outwardly, with their

flattened heads aud wicked-looking eyes. They are splendid for

colour, but personally I do not appreciate them as pets.


The Lear's Macaw on the other hand (and I believe the

Hyacinthine is much the same) is naturally a bird with a kindly

disposition. One is led to think so, if only from his outward

appearance ; his deep brown Cockatoo-like eyes and his large

rounded soft looking head give one confidence to at any rate offer

to stratch his poll, if he is a stranger to one. Comparisons are

not fair I know, but I cannot appreciate the naked skin of the

Red and Yellow Macaw's faces and also of the Blue and Yellow,

after being more used to the Lear's Macaws with their faces well

and respectably covered, and only enough bare skin of a splendid

orange-yellow to enhance the peacock blue-green of the sur-

rounding feathers. I think it is some colour very near that.

Peacock blue-green upon the whole head and under-parts, the

rest of the plumage being of a fine blue : of quite a different

shade to that in the Blue and Yellow Macaw or the Hyacinthine

either.


It is an extremely good blue, bright without being glaring.

Then I like the black bill, with the tongue within so curiously



