The Yellow and Green Lorikeet (Trichoglossus flavoviridis flavoviridis)


Distribution
The Yellow and Green Lorikeet comes from the Sula Island, in the east of Salawin.

Habitat
The islands mentioned above are still relatively undisturbed and most importantly they are covered in rainforest. Here there is almost no clearance of forest. For this reason the yellow and green lorikeet has also not been caught or exported in large numbers, so that at the moment there is no definite threat to this species. They come from altitudes of between 500 and 2000m. More than this there is very little known about this species. One understands that the diet is similar to that of other species and pollen and nectar form the basis of the diet.

Description
I will refer to the photograph for the general appearance of the bird. The yellow head markings differs, the mask may be more or less dark. With many pairs there is a great difference between the head colouration and the beak colours of the two sexes. There is a naked eye ring in this species which is only present in the Varied Lorikeet, Trichoglossus versicolor. The eye ring is an orange yellow in adult birds. There are also birds with lighter coloured eye rings, but this also depends on the daylight. Birds kept in outside aviaries only have this light colour in the first few months. Young birds resemble their parents as they leave the nest. The yellow colour is still rather washed in green, the beak is marked with dark brown. After about 6 months the young are fully coloured. The size of adult birds is about 21cm.

Status
Dr Wallace describes the Yellow and Green Lorikeet for the first time in 1862. At first it was thought that the species came from Celebes (see also Forshaw, 1981). This was proved later not to be the case.

This subspecies is one of the lesser known in captivity, opposite to nominate, the Meyers, Trichoglossus flavoviridis meyeri. T. f. meyeri comes from a neighbouring region, the Island of Sulawesi. In 1884 an indiviudual was identified and named as bonthainensis since it was found in the Bonthain mountains of south Celebes. This bird resembles the Meyers Lorikeet and is therefore thought to be just a different colour variation. I discovered a striking feature of the species T. f. flavoviridis, T. f. meyeri and T. johnstoniae (Mount Apo Lorikeet). I have prepared photographs of the fronts of all three species to compare and from these I have found almost identical scale markings. It would be interesting to have the results of further DNA and chromosome research with these three species and to determine evidence of the relationship between the Yellow and Green and the Mount Apo Lorikeets.

Husbandry and Breeding
W. Frost imported the first Yellow and Green Lorikeets into England in 1931. Further imports of this species are not known. In the seventy years a few birds have gone to Sweden, further details are not known. The next import in 1977 went to Vogel Park Walsrode (Germany). In a short time the breeding of four young occurred, but unfortunetely none survived for any great time. At the end of the 1980's a few birds arrived in Germany where they are now bred quite frequently.

In 1992 I obtained a pair of Yellow and Green Lorikeets from a German breeder. The birds appeared to be very healthy. I kept them in indoor aviairies with a connected outside aviary, where they could be regularly found during cold weather.

It is conspicuous that the strong voice which can be clearly quite loud is missing with the Meyers. This can be a problem in urban areas. Not all of my Yellow and Greens can have access to an outside flight. Small aviaries can create problems with this species sometimes, since the males can become quite aggressive towards their partner. I have therefore often had to separate pairs from eachother. I have observed the same with Meyers Lorikeets too.

My outside aviaries are about 1.5m long, 0.8m wide, 2m high. The top is covered in corrugated plastic. The floor is covered in a layer of large pebbles. The inside flight cages are fixed to a tiled wall. The pop hole is built over a window. The cages are 0.8m wide, 0.6m deep and 0.6m high. The floor is made from wire mesh. About 15cm under this is a thick layer of wood shavings on a shelf. This is changed weekly. The nest box hangs on the front of the cage and is accessible from the inside corridor. I use vertical nest boxes 35cm high and 22cm x 22cm on the base with an entrance hole of 6cm diameter.

Recently I have brought many birds into my new inside aviaries which are constructed from aluminium. They are 1.5m long, 45cm wide and high. Here I will probably try using nest boxes in a horizontal L-form.

My birds are all fed, including the Yellow and Greens, on Lorinectar from "AVES Product".  Occassionally they receive pieces of apple. Willow twigs are also often offered and serve to occupy these active birds.

Until the time of writing I have not had success at breeding these birds. One pair laid 3 eggs, which were all infertile.

As a rule the clutch consists of only 2 eggs. Other breeders give an incubation period of 23-24 days. Details of the rearing are similar to that for the Meyers. Maybe I or another breeder, can soon report on a successful breeding of these beautiful Lories.

References
MIVART, G. (1896): The Loriidae. Fundacef Verlag.
PAGEL, T. (1985): Loris. Eugen Ulmer Verlag.
LOW, R. (1977): Lories and Lorikeets. Paul Elek Limited.