www.katharinasittiche.de - Description - The Lineolated Parakeet

The Lineolated Parakeet belongs to the genus of the Thick-billed Parrots. As you can already deduce from the name, the beak is the most conspicuous characteristic feature of those little parakeets. It is compact, seems to be swollen. The cere is featherless, as well as a thin eye ring. The nostrils are uncovered. Most of the representatives of the genus Bolborhynchus own short and acuminate tail feathers, which is unusual for parakeets.
Obvious differences between the sexes cannot be found with any species of that genus. Only at the closely related Golden-fronted Parakeets (Psilopsiagon aurifrons), which formerly were counted to the genus of the Thick-billed Parrots, female and male can be distinguished.
On account of their small height and their pleasant voice Thick-billed Parrots are absolutely suitable for keeping in an apartment. The Lineolated Parakeets surely belongs to the most popular indoor birds of its genus.

The Lineolated Parakeet is more or less 16 to 17 cm long, but only 6 cm account for the tail. According to Dathe (1983) the wings measure about 10 cm.
The weight of a fully grown bird amounts to approximately 50 g.
The lifespan is stated with approximately 10 years (Alderton 1997), but older exemplars are known as well.

Generally speaking the Lineolated Parakeet is green. Due to its unspectacular plumage, which does not give a particular exotic look to the bird, and the calm nature the Lineolated Parakeet was considered "uninteresting" for a long time, not only for keeping as an pet but also for breeding. During the last years this has changed, partially due to the appearance of a large number of colour mutations .

Topography

The black plumage marking, typical for the Lineolated Parakeet, is only missing on the bright green underside and the forehead, cheek and throat. The flanks and breast sides are olive green, the feathers as well as the deep green head and back plumage are seamed black. This edging gets wider the closer it comes to the tail. The yellow-green upper and under tail feathers even are broadly tipped with black. These intensive markings can also be found on the dark green wing coverts. The elbow is black, as well as the feather points of both median tail feathers. The tail is dark green, as well as the primaries. The intensive black lined plumage of the back and both body sides sometimes have a brownish tinge. The thighs are yellow-green and the under wing coverts blue-green.

Topography

The grey eye ring is featherless, the big eyes are framed by fine eyelashes. The iris is dark-brown (dark-grey is stated in the literature, which is not understandable for me on account of my observations). The beak is horn-coloured with a dark upper beak tip, as well as the cere. The legs and feet are pinkish flesh-coloured, the claws are dark to nearly black.

The young birds of the Lineolated Parakeets are sometimes coloured paler, the beak and the legs are lighter than those of the adults and the forehead shows a light blue glimmer. However, you can find a blue gleam at the adult animals, too, at the front head as well as at the primaries or around the shoulders and the elbow. Because of that Bauer (1990) is of the opinion that you cannot definitively distinguish the squabs from the adult birds.

The sub-species of the type form, the Barred Parakeet (Bolborhynchus lineola tigrinus) shows a darker plumage as the B. l. lineola. At the largest part of the plumage the black edging is more distinctive, especially conspicuous is the extensive black shoulder (Arndt; 1986). The iris shall be brownish, feet and beak are darker. The Barred Parakeet was imported only in a small number to Europe. Due to the small amount of distinguishing features to the type form it can not be found out anymore, if there are still pure-bred specimen in Europe. Probably a large part of the Lineolated Parakeets living in Europe are hybrids of both sub-species.

Last update on February 21st, 2005