Macaws
The largest parrots there are, and wider wingtip to wingtip than most people's arms. The call was built to carry across rainforest canopy, and it still does.
Overview
A blue and gold macaw is 81 to 91 cm long with a 104 to 114 cm wingspan and weighs between 900 and 1,814 g. That is a bird with a four foot wingspan, and it is the number that decides whether a macaw fits a household rather than anything about temperament.
They live up to 50 years in the wild and in captivity, form monogamous pairs that mate for life, and in South America gather at riverbank clay licks to eat clay, which lets them handle the toxins in unripe seeds.
Temperament
Confident, affectionate and enormous. A macaw that likes someone is a wonderful animal, and a macaw that does not is a serious one, because the beak is built to crack palm nuts.
They are highly social and highly intelligent, and they bond hard. Screaming is normal flock behaviour at dawn and dusk rather than a fault, and it is very loud outdoors and overwhelming indoors. Most macaws that are given up are given up for the noise and the space, not for biting.
Care and grooming
A pellet base with vegetables, fruit and a genuine allowance of nuts, because macaws are among the few parrots whose natural diet is high in fat and they need it.
Bathing several times a week keeps the feathers and the skin right. Beak and nail maintenance comes from chewing hardwood, which needs replacing constantly. A macaw goes through more destructible material in a month than a smaller parrot does in a year.
Living and exercise
48 by 36 by 60 inches is a minimum cage and it is not enough on its own. A macaw needs a room or an outdoor flight where it can actually open its wings, and a bird that has never fully extended them is a bird with a permanent problem.
Fifty years is the planning horizon. A macaw bought at thirty is a bird that will outlive the buyer's working life, and rehoming an adult macaw is difficult because everyone who wants one already knows what it involves.
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