PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: Palm Cockatoo has dark plumage, and it is among the largest parrots, even if its size and its wingspan vary, according to the subspecies. (Only Hyacinth Macaw is larger).
Adults show wonderful erectile crest of several narrow elongated feathers. Upper mandible is strongly curved, and larger in male than in female. The black-tipped red tongue is well visible, due to separated black mandibles. Cheeks are covered with bare red skin which colour can vary from white to dark red, according to the health, the excitation and the environment of the bird. Eyes are brown, with grey eye-ring. Glossy back is covered in dusty down giving dull aspect and greyish tinge, contrasting with the dark body plumage.
Female resembles male, but she has shorter upper mandible, and she is smaller than male.
Immature has pale top of upper mandible. On the underparts, feathers are edged with pale yellow. It has white eye-ring.
We can find four subspecies, living in different geographic range, throughout Papua, New Guinea and Australia.
VOICE: Palm Cockatoo is a noisy forest bird. It can mimic calls of other animals and some sounds. At dawn, they call to each other before the sunrise. These calls are used to gather the birds.
Palm Cockatoo usually utters a loud whistle such as « keer-eeeow », with second prolonged note ending in abrupt inflection. In flight, it utters a repeated whistle. Alarm call is a short, harsh screech. When it is feeding, we can hear sometimes a kind of prolonged wailing cry.
HABITAT: Palm Cockatoo is relatively common, although they live in sparse isolated populations in subtropical rainforests, forest galleries, secondary growths with tall trees and wooded savannahs. This species can be found at forest edges, where there are trees adapted to their feeding behaviour and for nesting.
GEOGRAPHIC RANGE: Palm Cockatoo is endemic to Northern Australia and New Guinea. It lives in western Papua, Aru Islands and Indonesia.
BEHAVIOUR: Palm Cockatoo is usually seen in pairs or small groups of about six birds. However, flocks of up to 30 birds can be seen at food sources. Palm Cockatoo rests alone, in leafless branches and it is active after sunrise. But it can fly about during quiet moonlit nights.
Palm Cockatoos are active after the sunrise, performing some ritual displays with bowing head, erect crest and wings outspread. Males perform spectacular territorial displays while their bare facial skin becomes dark red. They give loud repeated calls, and strike several times against hollow trunks with a stone, or some large nut held in their left leg, in order to produce resonant knocking.
Breeding pairs remain in their territory, while young birds and non-breeding adults wander beyond the territory boundaries.
Palm Cockatoos are mainly arboreal, but they can be seen on the ground where they take fallen fruits. They also dig into the soil in order to reach minerals.
They collect splintered bits of wood used, layer upon layer, to form thick platform in the bottom of the nest-cavity. Dead leaves and woodchips at base of trees are the real signs of intense nesting activity.
FLIGHT: Palm Cockatoo performs laboured flight with slow wing-beats and glides with down curved wings. Bill held down against the breast gives it stunning silhouette.
REPRODUCTION / NESTING: Palm Cockatoos are not able to hollow out in trees, and they have to find large natural cavities adapted to their large size. They can find them in very old trees. Nest-site is situated a great height, and the cavity reaches sometimes one metre in depth.
Such large holes need hard competition with other bird’s species, reptiles or bees.
Palm Cockatoo uses several nest materials for lining the cavity, such as sticks of Eucalyptus, bamboos, acacias and willows. They maintain territories with several suitable nest-sites.
When breeding season starts, they perform numerous exploration flights, in order to visit these potential nest-sites. They reuse the same nests year after year.
Breeding period usually occurs from August to January, according to the weather.
Male performs courtship displays before copulation, with upright head, erect crest and several bows, while it utters loud whistles.
Female lays only one egg, and both parents incubate during 30 to 33 days, but female is the main incubator, while the male provides food to the chicks.
Chick hatches naked, without any down. Its mother broods it in order to keep it warm, until it gets some plumage. When it is feathered, female leaves the nest and searches for food with its mate.
The young remains at nest during 100 to 110 days that is one of the longest periods at nest in parrot’s species. When fledged, it can’t fly and adults feed it during six weeks more. It remains with its parents until the next breeding season. At this moment, parents chase it from the territory.
Palm Cockatoo reaches its sexual maturity at about 6 or 7 years of age.
FOOD HABITS: Palm Cockatoo feeds on seeds, nuts, fruits, berries and blooms. Its diet is mainly vegetarian, but it also consumes insects and their larvae.
PROTECTION / THREATS: Palm Cockatoo populations are not globally threatened, but at this moment, they are classified as Near Threatened. Habitat loss, changes in the environment and in addition, the aviary trade, and hunting for food in New Guinea are the most important threats for this species.
Captive breeding programs are running in Europe and North America.
Sources:
"Parrots of the world" by Joseph M. Forshaw.
"Handbook of the Birds of the World" Vol.4.
Personal observations at Loro Parque Breeding Center
