Thaimaçu, Pará, Brazil
April 2003

The Bald Parrot caused a sensation when it was described in 2002 mainly because it is hard to believe that such a large and colourful bird could have escaped the notice of the world.

The description was published in The Auk 119(3):815-819, 2002 and is entitled "Description of a New Species of Pionopsitta (Aves: Psittacidae) Endemic to Brazil. The authors are Renato Gaban-Lima, Marcos A. Raposo and Elizabeth Höfling.

A copy of this paper is available at http://www.scricciolo.com/Pionipsitta%20aurantiocephala.pdf It includes a map showing the distribution of Bald Parrot in the lower Madeira and upper Tapajós rivers and specifically in the São Benedito and Cururu tributaries of the Teles Pires river.

It appears to inhabit gallery forest and "campinarana" white-sand soil forest of which there is quite an expanse near the Thaimaçu Lodge and which probably links up with the white-sand area near the Serra de Cachimbo that can be seen from the Cuiabá - Santarém road.

It is a strikingly coloured parrot and, were it not for its bald head could be classified as very attractive.

The final photograph is of the fruits that the birds, a flock of about 20, were eating in the late afternoon from a tree close to the lodge on the left bank of the São Benedito River. There was only a thin outer layer of the fruit that was being eaten.

We also came across smaller flocks on the right bank of the São Benedito River.

Jeremy Minns recorded the birds as they were feeding.