Amazon Blue Fronted Parrot

Other 225 seized parrots!!!

Category: Nestlings, Pantanal, illegal wildlife trade | Date: Oct 06 2008 | By: blueparrot

Other 225 nestling parrots were seized last week by the Military Police at Mato Grosso do Sul state!!! Now they sum 600 blue-fronted parrots and 16 yellow-faced parrots, taken from their nests to supply the (national and international) illegal animal trade – only on this reproductive season!!! These animals are now receiving health care at the Wild Animal Rehabilitation Center (CRAS) at Campo Grande. Since it was created 20 years ago, the CRAS has received thousands and thousands of blue-fronted parrot nestlings. Most of them captured on the board of Sao Paulo and Mato Grosso do Sul states. The smugglers know this area pretty well, and sometimes stairs are left year-round at the nest-threes to facilitate the capture on the following reproductive season! This year the illegal capture of these animals was unquestionably very intense; however, it will take three to four years for this huge decrease of recruitment to affect the wild population of parrots – about when the parrots would start their reproduction. The Blue-fronted Parrot Project aims to raise public awareness about the consequences of this uncontrolled illegal capture of the parrots. For the part decade we have been trying to instruct public not to acquire/buy those animals for pets – no consumers/buyers, no reason for the smugglers to capture them.We hope to come back with some better news next time.

3 Responses to “Other 225 seized parrots!!!”

Angela, on 08 Oct 2008

How sad. These animals are smuggled and sold in pet stores and the like, right?

Baraza » Disturbing times for parrots, on 08 Oct 2008

[…] the IUCN reports yesterday I was shocked to read Glaucia’s latest blog post from Brazil about 225 MORE baby parrots seized - this was in addition to the 400 parrots seized earlier. Parrots, are among the most intelligent […]

blueparrot, on 08 Oct 2008

Thank you all for your comments. Most of these parrots would be sold on roads for people who drive by, or on food/animal market, which are pretty common in Brazil. They would be sold for something around US$25 each. And whoever buys it, has no idea about where it came from, or that for each parrot that survived the illegal capture/transport/housing, 9 other parrots died. And to make it worse, these people have no idea about how to raise a parrot - most of the captive problems are due a poor nutrition during the first months of age. The animals develop a very severe deformity on wings, legs, and spine, which are not reversible.
On the other hand, here in Brazil is possible to legally purchase a parrot from a certified breeder, for about US$600. People who buy legal birds usually know how to raise them, and can afford good nutrition and health care. In my opinion, the key point is to educate people, raising awareness about the illegal animal trade, exposing the pros and cons of having a parrot as a pet (that can live for several decades), support the legal animal trade, and severely punish whoever is caught smuggling or keeping an illegal animal at home. Unfortunately, the law here is not severe enough to scare people from doing that.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS