A small yellow-green parrot (length 12 cm) with blue on its
wings (the male), the smallest of all 25 parrots and macaws in
Suriname. They fly in groups and with high velocity through
gardens, making a lot of noise 'greegree, greegree, greegree'.
Without these cries you wouldn't notice them so easily with their
green colors. They eat seeds, fruit and flowers and they find
them in more open terrain. This way they are not affected like
other species of South-American parrots by the degradation of the
forest. And as a consequence they like town. They even nest
there, I saw a pair making a nest in a high dead branch of a
cotton tree (Ceiba pentandra, kankantri) on the campus of the
university (Johan Ingels found the nest, he is specialised in
finding nests!). For their nest they need holes in trees or in
the nests of termites, like so many parrots.
If you have a pair of these parrotlets in a cage in Suriname,
chances are that groups of free birds will come around every day
and make contact via their calls. The free birds have the better
life, I suppose.
The first picture of a pair of Green-rumped parrotlets was made
by Carl Beel at Weg naar Zee in September 2008, the female has
more yellow on her head. The second one was made by Wouter
Plouvier at Weg naar Zee, Suriname in December 2006. Below this
text you see photos made by Leo Olmatak in his garden in
Paramaribo in 2009 and then follows a picture made by J.S.
Dunning at my home in Suriname long ago.
Each small square indicates the observation of at least one (group) of these birds, the medium ones at least 4 observations on different days and the largest ones 10 or more. The color of each square indicates: blue for coastal area, yellow for savanna and red for rainforest. Mostly seen in small groups, sometimes up to 30 birds.
| Distribution in Suriname (explanation) | |
| Coastal area |  |
| Savanna |  |
| Forests |  |
| Mountain forests |  |
| Sipalawini savanna | |
Names in
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