Photo: Fernando Moraes
The Mealy Parrot is a psittaciform bird from the Psittacidae family. It’s the biggest Brazilian parrot. Also known as curica, jeru, juru, ajuru, juru-açu, ajuruaçu and moleiro. It is the largest species of the genus, measuring around 40 cm in length. It also has green plumage, covered in a very fine white powder (farinosa – the origin of its scientific name), a generally yellow, blue and red cap, a white beak and periophthalmic ring, a red wing mirror and a long tail with a light green tip. Very similar to its relative, the Yellow-crowned Parrot , it differs from the latter by its darker iris, the absence of red at the base of the tail feathers and a smaller yellow area on the crown. It also has less red in the wing mirror, a feature that is more visible in flight.