Great Green Macaw

Birds are usually observed in pairs or small groups of up to four to eight birds, very rarely more. In Costa Rica it breeds in the lowlands, but disperses to higher elevations afterwards, gathering together in flocks which migrate in search of food. In Costa Rica these flocks usually consist of up to 18 birds. This species rests and forages in the upper areas of the canopy. In Nicaragua these macaws are notably unwary of humans and when feeding will often allow a person to come quite close to them. Older residents of the region where Ara ambiguus ssp. guayaquilensis lives relate that until the 1970s or 1980s it would gather together to undertake a daily migration from the mangrove forests at estuaries along the seashore near the village of Puerto Hondo, crossing the Guayaquil-Salinas road in flocks, to the dry hilly woodlands of the Cerro Blanco Forest.

The great green macaw lives in tropical forests in the Atlantic wet lowlands of Central from Honduras to Panama and Colombia, and in South America in the Pacific coastal lowlands in Panama, Colombia and western Ecuador, where they also occur in deciduous (seasonal), dry tropical forests. In Colombia, where both species occur, it prefers more humid woodlands than the closely related military macaw. The habitat where it breeds in Costa Rica is practically non-seasonal, evergreen rainforest, with rain some ten months of the year, a precipitation of 1,500 to 3,500 mm a year, and an average temperature of 27 °C throughout the year. In Costa Rica the habitats where great green macaws occur during breeding season is dominated by the almendro (Dipteryx oleifera) and Pentaclethra macroloba, with secondarily raffia palms (Raphia spp.) dominated wetlands. It is usually observed below 600 m above sea level in Costa Rica during the breeding season, but disperses to higher elevations to 1000 m after breeding, and can be seen as high as 1500 m in southern Panama. The population in Ecuador is thought to be split into two disjunct areas in the western coast of the country, the coastal mountain range of the Cordillera de Chongon in southwestern Ecuador, and in the far north bordering Colombia from the west in Río Verde Canton in central coastal Esmeraldas Province, stretching eastwards into Imbabura Province. This bird is very uncommon in Ecuador. In Colombia it is reasonably common in the Darién region and the Gulf of Urabá near the Panamanian border, and is also found in the north of the Serranía de Baudó mountains on the Pacific coast, the West Andes, and found eastwards to the dry forests of the upper Sinú valley near the Caribbean coast. In Panama it is common in some areas such as the Caribbean slope and in parts of Darién National Park such as the famous Cana birdwatching site and across the Alto de Nique mountain and the adjacent border with Colombia. It is also found in Panama in the mountains of the Serranía de Majé near Panama City and the southern Cerro Hoya mountains. In Costa Rica in the early 2000s, the reproductive range of the great green macaw was thought to be restricted to 600 to 1120 km of very wet forests in the northeast along the border with Nicaragua. After the breeding season this population disperse in larger groups to higher altitudes both southwards in the central cordillera of Costa Rica as well as northwards to Nicaragua. Another population was known by 2007 in the hills inland between Old Harbour and Sixaola near the northern Panamanian border. In Nicaragua there are populations in the east of the country in the Bosawás, Indio Maíz Biological Reserve and San Juan reserves. It occurs in a number of areas in eastern Honduras such as the Río Plátano Biosphere Reserve, where it is rare. Historically this macaw had a larger range. For example: in 1924 it was collected in Limón, Costa Rica, in 1904 and 1907 around Matagalpa, Nicaragua and in 1927 in Almirante, Panama.

ENDANGERED. CITES I. Retreating in response to habitat loss throughout its range, and sensitive to habitat disturbance.