Abstract
In the bird world, parrots are unique. Their popularity stems from their striking plumage, the ease with which they can be tamed and their uncanny ability to mimic human voices.
Yet it is not these features that make them unlike any other group of birds. Rather, it is the array of threats which they face.
No other group is threatened by such a multitude and complex interrelationship of pressures including natural disasters, habitat destruction, hunting for food, feathers and the live bird trade; while at the same time being long-lived, and slow-breeding.
Cracids are hunted for food and under threat from habitat destruction, yet are spared the enormous prices offered for their psittacine cousins.
Raptors, such as the Peregrine Falcon, command huge sums from the Arab world, yet are seldom if ever eaten; and the smaller passerines - trapped in their millions for trade - breed rapidly and few face imminent extinction.
Around the world many psittacine species are in decline, nowhere more so than in the small insular nations of the Caribbean.
In October 1492, Christopher Columbus "discovered" the West Indies. Stretching some 1,500 miles in a broad southeastern arc between Florida and northern South America, they comprise an archipelago rich in biotic diversity and, at that time, home to 27 species of macaws, parrots and parakeets.
In the intervening half millennium, 14 of the 27 psittacines believed to be in existence at that time have become extinct.
All seven species of macaws have vanished, as have five of eight species of parakeets and three of the twelve species of Amazon parrots.
Those that remain have small or declining populations or are threatened with extinction. Perhaps the most beautiful of these is the Saint Vincent Parrot, Amazona quildinquii.
This species, with its kaleidoscope of plumage colors, has probably never been very abundant and reports from as early as the turn of the century describe it as scarce.
Clark (1905), in his paper "Birds of the Southern Lesser Antilles," wrote, ' 'This bird is now decidedly rare on Saint Vincent where it is confined to the highest wooded slopes in the center of the island behind Barrouallie. Some idea of its scarcity may be had from the fact that during a walk from Hermitage, in the Upper Cumberland Valley, south along the central ridge of the island, only two were met with, although it is in this region that they are said to be most common'.'
In the early 1980s, Lambet et al estimated the population of the Saint Vincent Parrot to be 421 ± 52 and noted that many parrots were being taken for sale to tourists.
Their report states, '' One villager ... claimed to have caught 27 nestlings during a two to three year period although 33% of them died before he was able to sell them."
The report's authors also emphasize the adverse effects of deforestation stating, '' agriculture extends to the periphery of all the forested areas, with the exception of the upper Richmond Valley and Morne Garu Mountains and undoubtedly caused much habitat destruction in the past.''
If man has been the cause of this species' problems, men are now the reason for its recent change in fortune - men like Senior Forestry Supervisor Brian Johnson, and Forestry Officers Lennox Quammie , Carlton Thomas and Fitzroy Springer.
Through their dedicated efforts, legislation has been enacted, reserves established, successful captive breeding programs initiated, education programs implemented and the birds' decline arrested.
Much of their success stemmed from changing public perceptions about this beautiful bird and its declaration as a national symbol.
In marketing the conservation message, a small U.S. based conservation organization played a catalytic role. Through providing technical and material assistance, RARE Center has helped men like Brian to help their endemic wildlife. Results from a preproject questionnaire, undertaken in January 1989, indicated that while the vast majority of Vincentians knew the parrot to be their national bird, few knew how rare it was, the reasons for its decline or the levels of legal protection afforded to it and its forest home.
This was soon to change and under Brian's direction and with RARE Center's assistance, parrot fever soon swept the island. Posters, billboards, badges and bumper stickers could be seen everywhere. Vincie's song, a parrot conservation tune, was taught to 18,000 children and visits made to every primary and secondary school.
Churches rallied to the cause giving environmental sermons and musicians lent their support writing catchy calypsos that were aired on the radio and made into music videos.