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  • RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT

Americans farmed a huge and raucous parrot a millennium ago

The noisy scarlet macaw, which can reach nearly 90 centimetres in length, was bred far from its tropical habitat.
North Central American Scarlet Macaw (Ara macao cyanoptera)

The scarlet macaw, which is native to the tropics, may have been bred by prehistoric North Americans more than 1,000 years ago. Credit: Roland Seitre/Minden Pictures/Getty

Prehistoric North Americans began breeding parrots more than 1,000 years ago — an enterprise that supplied the valuable birds to a large swathe of what is now the southwestern United States.

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Nature 560, 412 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-05932-1

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