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The Carolina Parakeet Mystery

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The Carolina Parakeet Mystery in them in a state ofsemi - hibernation the spring of 1934, a George the when the weather turned cold. Malamphy, who had worked at The Carolina. Parakeet was also Cornell University, made a journey to Carolina bred in captivity. The first captive South Carolina for the purpose of breeding occurred in France in 1877. ornithological research involving the Parakeet In the U.S. it was bred for the first time wild turkey. During this period, he . by the Philadelphia Zoo in 1885, fol­ reported that he sighted the Carolina Mystery lowed by the Cincinnati Zoo, where Parakeet on eight or nine occasions dozens were reared,· especially after and in one instance he saw as many as by Tom Marshall, Leesburg, Virginia newly captured birds were added to seven at one time. the collection. These parrots appear to Based on the possibility that he Cincinnati authorities listed have been colony breeders and Malamphy might have been correct, the death of the 32 year old enjoyed brief popularity as aviary birds the National Audubon Society leased a T male as having occurred in the United States and Europe. large area in the same vicinity and, in sometime during a cold February day However, their being inexpensive, 1936, established a base camp on the in 1918, but for about 20 years report­ common and noisy contributed to property so that they could make a ed sightings by reliable sources chal­ their decline in the supply and determined effort to spot the parrot. In lenged the official report. demand world of aviculture. They their official reports, they indicated the Compounding this seventy-year-old were largely forgotten until it was too sightings of at least one definite mystery are questions today about the late. Carolina Parakeet and a number of true identity of the deceased. Arthur Freud, author of several other sightings which appeared to be This was not your typical murder books on parrots and former publisher Caroiina Parakeets. In June, 1938, a mystery. The individual who died that of the American Cage-Bird Magazine, game warden in the area spotted a pair February was not killed, like so many uncovered an interesting article in the of the Parakeets flying with their of his family that preceded him; he May-June, 1975 issue of "South young. most likely died of old age. He and his Carolina Wildlife," entitled "The Another mystery for which the kin had been hunted and driven from Parakeet Mystery" by George Laycock, Carolina Parakeet is an illustration is their homes, by the greatest of adver­ a natural history writer. the problem ofhow parrots have been saries - man. He was, tragically, the Laycock decided to investigate the classified. Classification, according to last parrot of his kind. death of the last Carolina Parakeet, as Joseph Forshaw, "is an attempt to sub­ My concern in this case coincided he felt it a mystery that the final mem­ ject living, ever -changing organisms to with my initial interest in parrots. Years ber of the entire race of parrots static, "pigeonhole" arrangements, so it ago, I visited the Smithsonian endemic to the United States could is inevitable that there will be short­ Institution's Natural History Museum in have been allowed to disappear with­ comings." The classification system in nearby Washington, D.C. for the out incontrovertible records being kept use today is an attempt to describe express purpose ofseeing parrot skins. ofits passing. The official date ofdeath organisms in some kind of order. It is Although I saw many exotics, it was for the last captive Carolina Parakeet is not, however, ordained from above. It the mounted specimens of the February 21, 1918. This male parrot, is not even very scientific and there Carolina Parakeet in the Hall of Birds given the name "Incas," died at the age may also be a reluctance to reorganize which was displayed in such a realistic of 32, coincidentally in the same established categories. setting that made the greatest impres­ Cincinnati Zoo where Martha, the last The 300-plus species of parrots are sion on me. Passenger Pigeon, also succumbed. really a very homogeneous assem­ Here was a race of parrots, native Laycock wondered if the zoo offi­ blage of birds, so differences available exclusively to the United States and cials could be premature in tolling the for separation into lower categories are with a range extending into my own bell of extinction for the last Carolina minor. Taxonomists have always had state ofVirginia that I would never see. Parakeet. Could Carolina Parakeets difficulties classifying parrots and, The Carolina Parakeet Conuropsis car­ have found refuge from encroaching again according to Forshaw, "most olinensis lived in huge numbers, pri­ civilization within some remote arrangements proposed have been marily in the great cypress forests of swamp or heavily forested area? largely artificial. There are no anatom­ Florida, Louisiana, and the Carolinas. It Laycock mentions in his article that in ical characters that can be said to be an lived in smaller numbers in other the spring of 1926, Charles Doe, cura­ absolute criterion for attempting to southern states and was sighted as far tor ofbirds at the University ofFlorida, group Parrots and to define their north as Ohio. Their large concentra­ actually located three pairs of these respective affinities." tion in the south was the result of a parakeets in Okeechobee County, Although it resembles the Aratinga heavy dependence (or preference) for Florida. He did not collect any birds, conures, a polytypic (having more the fruit of the cypress tree. These but he took five of their eggs, which than one species) genus, the Carolina conure-type birds also found the hol­ are currently in a museum collection in Parakeet is classified as the monotypic low trunks of dead cypress trees to be Gainesville, Florida. (one species) genus, Conuropsis. Its ideal nests and were known to winter Mr. Laycock next discovered that in description, however, is not apprecia- 42 MarchiApril 1998 ~ Co could certainly make it easier to o Q. assume that it was in a genus of its E o >. own and this is what I believe influ­ .D o a enced Salvadori in 1891. ~ Cl... Forshaw, however, states that some doubt always exists concerning the sta­ tus of isolates, because one can never be certain whether they would inter­ breed or not, if brought together with like-birds; it is a matter for taxonomic judgment. (Interbreeding is what defines a species). Today, the prevail­ ing practice is to emphasize affinities, and isolates are generally treated as subspecies or races ofa single species. Therefore, I prefer to think of the Carolina Parakeet as the Carolina Conure and I await the day, with the advent of DNA testing and other tech­ The Carolina Parakeet nological advances, for a revision of ./1'nzen in time at the taxonomy of parrots. tbe Smitbsonian. The Carolina Parakeet's status as a Wbicb conure in monotypic genus has not benefited your collection most this species. Perhaps its reclassification rese1nhles tbe Carolina Parakeet? as an Aratinga might suggest the con­ servation strategy of introduction, by translocation, of a similar species (one which is endangered by habitat degra­ dation or loss elsewhere) into an area of the Carolina Parakeet's former habi­ bly different from that ofAratingas. So a genus of its own, but I can't find out tat that is not impacted by human why isn't it classified as an Aratinga what it is. Surely Salvadori did not activity. Greater knowledge should Conure? I don't know the answer, and know of all the Aratinga conures we provide greater discretion for all those my investigation into this question know of today. I suspect that he had a who are interested, and open, to ways leads me to believe that neither do the very limited sampling from which to which we can save parrots. experts. compare. Had he the forty-eight Is the true identity of the Carolina Aratinga is a genus erected by an species and sub-species of Aratinga Parakeet Conuropsis or Aratinga? Did individual named Spix (1824) for a Conures to compare with the Carolina the Carolina ParakeetiConure die out group of Central and South American Parakeet, given all the gradations they in 1918 in an Ohio Zoo or sometime parakeets. Conuropsis is a Genus erect­ offer, he would not have seen the after 1938 in the wilds of South ed by a taxonomist named Salvadori Carolina Parakeet as a super-species, Carolina, or is it possible that some­ (1891) in volume 20 of the Catalogue deserving ofgenus status, but merely a where in the depths of the contiguous of Birds of the British Museum. What representative on the wide spectrum Florida and South Carolina swamps made Salvadori so insistent that he had presented by this group of birds. there exists the remnants ofa decimat­ a monotypic genus on his hands was I would venture the guess that ed, but a little wiser, population of not revealed with his entry in the Salvadori may have labeled the America's native parrot? Is parrot intro­ Catalogue. Forshaw states that Carolina Parakeet as a monotypic duction into favorable habitat in the Salvadori used a classification system genus for two arbitrary reasons: First, United States desirable or feasible? The based entirely on external features. He the partial remains of the oldest parrot case ofthe Carolina Parakeet mysteries and others of a like-mind who fol­ (20 million years old) from what is should be reopened for further investi­ lowed have been criticized because now the American Continent was gation if we want some answers to emphasis was placed on what are now found in Nebraska, and was given the these questions.
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