Guest Post By: Marguerite Floyd

Before parrots took over my life, I recognized four species: big colorful ones like macaws, little bitty ones like parakeets, shrieking ones like conures, and all those non-descript green ones. That seemed perfectly obvious and logical to me.

Okay, so I underestimated just a little. 

First, let’s define what a species is

This is the clearest definition I could find, from biologydictionary.net:
“A species is a group of organisms that share a genetic heritage, are able to interbreed, and to create offspring that are also fertile. Different species are separated from each other by reproductive barriers.”

A subspecies, on the other hand, is “a group which can interbreed successfully with other subspecies, but does not do so in practice (e.g., due to geographical isolation).”

We could also mention here even more categories like breeds, populations, varieties, and forms, but let’s not get ourselves too confused yet. Instead, let’s plug in some basic numbers.

The World Parrot Trust says (in 2025) there are “over 400 parrot species.”

The BBC says there are “over 350 species of parrots.” 

Wikipedia puts that number at exactly 402 or 410 then complicates things by stating “Parrots . . . make up the order Psittaciformes, found in most tropical and subtropical regions . . . the order is subdivided into “three superfamilies: the Psittacoidea ("true" parrots), the Cacatuoidea (cockatoos), and the Strigopoidea (New Zealand parrots).”

True parrots are those with a “beak with a characteristic curved shape, the jaw with a mobility slightly higher than where it connects with the skull, and a generally upright position. . . . They are good fliers and skillful climbers on branches of trees.” Think macaws, greys, lovebirds, conures, Amazons, and budgies.

Wikipedia tells us that Cacatuoidea (cockatoos) are known for their crests and curved beaks. There are 21 species of cockatoo, including the ever-popular cockatiel. Eleven of these species exist in the wild only in Australia, while seven species occur only in the islands of the Philippines, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands.) There are also the galah, the mainly grey gang-gang cockatoo, and the large black-plumaged palm cockatoo.

Then comes the third super family, the Strigopoidea (New Zealand parrots). Think of mischievous keas and kākāpō.

Why Should We Care?

So now that we’ve got that straightened out, who cares how many species there are? Four used to be good enough for me; what good does it do to think of “402” or “over 350?”

Actually, it matters a lot. Without knowing how many of what types of parrot exist, we’d never know how many are endangered or already extinct. Without that information we’d never be able to accurately measure the loss or determine any new species or subspecies, much less discover the factors that lead to these changes.

We know that parrot species become endangered and then extinct for all kinds of reasons; we’re just not sure how often this happens. Then someone stumbles across a new species of parrot or decides that an existing subspecies is really its own species. We’re not sure how often this happens either. Thus, the numbers change every year (or maybe every month).

A world with only four species of parrot would be a world less bright and wonderous for all of us – a world where scientists would have to find other, even more drab, things to count and categorize and subdivide. And where’s the fun in that?

PS: No, I did not forget to mention Old World parrots and New World parrots. I’m saving that one for a future blog post.

References:

https://www.bbcearth.com/factfiles/animals/birds/parrot
https://biologydictionary.net/species/
https://biology.stackexchange.com/questions/26105/what-is-difference-between-breed-variant-subspecies-and-species
https://parrots.org/learn/encyclopedia/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cockatoo
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cockatoo#Relationship_with_humans
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_parrots
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parrot
https://www.wikiwand.com/en/articles/True_parrots