Blue-banded parakeet, Blue-banded grass-parakeet
The blue-winged parrot (Neophema chrysostoma ), also known as the blue-banded parakeet or blue-banded grass-parakeet, is a small parrot found in Tasmania and southeast mainland Australia. It is partly migratory, with populations of blue-winged parrots travelling to Tasmania for the summer. The parrot is sexually dimorphic – the males have more blue on the wings and a two-toned blue frontal band on the head, while females are duller and have more green on the wings and a wingbar. Both sexes have predominantly olive-green plumage. Predominantly a feeder on the ground, the blue-winged parrot mainly eats seeds of grasses. It adapts readily to captivity.
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TerrestrialTerrestrial animals are animals that live predominantly or entirely on land (e.g., cats, ants, snails), as compared with aquatic animals, which liv...
Oviparous animals are female animals that lay their eggs, with little or no other embryonic development within the mother. This is the reproductive...
Arboreal locomotion is the locomotion of animals in trees. In habitats in which trees are present, animals have evolved to move in them. Some anima...
Flocking birds are those that tend to gather to forage or travel collectively. Avian flocks are typically associated with migration. Flocking also ...
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MigratingAnimal migration is the relatively long-distance movement of individual animals, usually on a seasonal basis. It is the most common form of migrati...
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starts withRanging from 20 to 24 cm long and weighing around 55 g, the parrot is sexually dimorphic—both sexes are predominantly olive-green. The adult male has a two-toned band across the face above but not reaching the eyes—ultramarine above and paler turquoise blue below. Its crown is yellowish, and throat and breast pale green and belly yellow, its wing coverts and under wing coverts are deep blue. The tail is blue-grey. The bill is blue-grey and the iris is brown. The adult female is duller with dull olive underparts and smaller blue on wings and less distinctive frontal band. Juveniles are dull olive green with slate-blue wings and no frontal band.
The greater amount of blue on the wing helps distinguish the Blue-winged parrot from the elegant parrot and the orange-bellied parrot. The latter two species have more yellow-green and bright green plumage overall respectively.
The blue-winged parrot is found across southeastern Australia. In eastern South Australia, it is found north to the Flinders Ranges, and across Victoria. It is more sporadic across central and western New South Wales and into Queensland, as far north as Diamantina National Park. It lives in savannah woodland, grasslands, orchards, farmlands, marshes, heath, dunes, and other open habitats up to 1,200 m (3,937 ft) above sea level. It is one of only three species of parrot that make regular yearly migrations over a sea or ocean, with many members of the species flying between Tasmania, where they breed in spring and summer, and the mainland, where they winter. Some birds, however, do remain in Tasmania over the winter and some remain on the mainland to breed in the summer.
It is a spring visitor to King Island in the Bass Strait.
Blue-winged parrots mainly feed on the ground, eating seeds of grasses, including wallaby grass (Austrodanthonia ), silver hairgrass (Aira caryophyllea ), pale sundew (Drosera peltata ) in Tasmania, and Poa caespitosa and the introduced capeweed (Arctotheca calendula ) on the mainland, and in Queensland tangled lignum (Muehlenbeckia florulenta ). They have been seen feeding alongside the European goldfinch in Victoria. Flock size ranges from pairs in breeding season to up to 2,000 birds just before autumn migration.
Breeding takes place from September to January, with one to two broods attempted each season. Blue-winged parrots use hollows of live and dead trees, generally eucalypts, as nesting sites up to 20 m above the ground. The clutch consists of four to six round or oval glossy white eggs, each of which is generally 22 mm long by 19 mm (0.8 by 0.7 in) wide. Incubation takes around 20 days and baby birds spend another 35 days in the nest.
