Bolivian Amazon without macaws

Parks in the Bolivian Amazon are home to a total of ten species of macaws, 16 of which are found elsewhere in the world. However, four of them face serious threats to conservation due to hunting, loss of habitat and trafficking of wild animals, reasons for which they are now considered critically endangered by the Trade of Endangered Wild Fauna and Flora Species (Cites), and are on the red list of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (UICN).

Endangered species

The Blue-throated macaw (Ara glaucogularis), a Bolivian endemic species, has a population that does not exceed 300 individuals, as stated by the (Associação Armonia). They are facing serious threats due to hunting by some indigenous groups, such as the chimanes and moxenhos, who live in the state of Beni and have the ancestral custom of plucking their feathers to use them as decorations or in dances like the "Macheteros", in an allusion to the work of the rubber tappers.

The situation is different with the Scarlet macaw (Ara macao) in that its main threat comes from illegal trading, which sells them as pets. The characteristic intense and vivid colours make them one of the most sought after birds - their beautiful specimen being easily found in different markets across Bolivia. Its population is unknown but estimated to be low, since it figures in Appendix I of endangered species in the Cites catalogue.

The Military Macaw (Ara militaris) - with colours that resemble a military uniform - faces threats due to the loss of their natural habitat as result of illegal logging within the Biosphere Reserve and Biological Station of Beni, one of the parks where it is found. The opening of several roads in the vicinity and within the reserve in order to extract trees such as mahogany (Swietenia macrophylla), cedar (Cedrela odorata),sandbox hura (Hura crepitans) and peppertree (Astronium sp.) are seriously degrading its ecosystem and altering its natural cycle, since it was forced to emigrate to other woodlands where they were not seen before. It is also listed in the Appendix I of the Cites catalogue.

Another endangered species is the Blue macaw (Anodorhynchus hyacinthinus), the largest of all. In Bolivia, the population is between 200 and 400 individuals. One of its main threats is loss of habitat caused by forest fires - 140 thousand km2 of Bolivian Amazonian rainforest were lost over the last decade. The fire of 2010 devastated some 667,396 hectares in the province of Velasco, in the state of Santa Cruz, where the Noel Kempff Mercado National Park is - one of their natural habitats - burning panama (Sterculia apetala), earpod (Enterolobium contortisiliquum) and peppertree (Astronium sp.), trees, where the Blue macaw builds its nests. The fires left them homeless, directly affecting the rate of reproduction, which is currently very low.

The conservation future of these magnificent birds, regarded as a symbol of beauty and animal wealth in the Bolivian Amazon, does not look very bright according to the Amazonian parks where the macaws live, as the Noel Kempff in Santa Cruz, the Biosphere Reserve and Biological Station in Beni and the Madidi, in La Paz.

Different works and projects like the construction of dams (Cachuela Esperanza on the Beni River), roads (Apolo, La Paz, TIPNIS, Beni and Cochabamba) and oil exploration (Madidi, La Paz) will cause the fragmentation of its natural habitats, create barriers and seriously alter their migratory and reproductive cycles, actions that could leave the Bolivian Amazon without macaws.