Animal-World > Pet Birds > Macaws > Harlequin Macaw

Harlequin Macaw

Family: Psittacidae

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"Frida" Harlequin Macaw -with a Green-winged Macaw Father Photo Courtesy S. Geldman

   The Harlequin Macaws are some of the most beautiful and well behaved of all the hybrid macaws.

   The Harlequin Macaws are a cross between a Blue and Gold Macaw and a Green-winged Macaw which makes for a very affectionate, energetic, and captivating youngster.  Both parents of the Harlequin Macaw also contribute to the striking colors of their offspring, though the father's have the dominant gene and this will influence their final appearance.

   " Frida" shown above has a Green-winged Macaw father, and the young Harlequin Macaw shown below has a Blue and Gold father. They both are very sweet affectionate birds and wonderful pets.

To learn about "Frida's" hand rearing
and her first experiences in her new home, visit here: Frida!

   Dr, Jungle says.."See what good parental influences can do!"

   Harlequin Macaws can all be good "talkers" as are the parents. If handled by more people and by both sexes when young, they will tend to be friendly to others rather than to just one person or one gender. However every macaw, as do people, have their own personality.

  Hybrid breeding combinations are given on the Hybrid Macaws page.

For information about the care of Macaws see:
Guide to a Happy, Healthy Macaw

Comments from people who have kept this pet:

I just bought a Baby Macaw thats Harlequin and Red Scarlet. My baby's name is Ten-Ten. Ten-Ten loves attention and everybody around. Too cute! I wish everyone could see her. I Love Macaw's, they make awesome life Companions.

It's now almost 19 months since I brought Maxie my Harlequin Macaw home with me. I love her so much. She's come a long way, I've taught her three tricks and she really talks her head off. Not just mimicking, she actually answers you and speaks appropriatly. I'll look at her loveingly and she says, "What?" Then I'll tell her. "I just love looking at you." To that she'll reply,"OH." My Maxie perches on my forearm and tells me, "I LOVE YOU". I wish that I could show her photo.

5 days ago I bought my first parrot, a Harlequin Macaw. She is so gorgeous and smart. She tells one of my dogs who won't stop barking to "SHUT UP". The Only trouble with Maxie is....She won't let me near her or her feed dishes. She got one good bite on my fore arm.

I have a Harlequin and he is 2 years old July 2006. I Bought him when he was 8 weeks old. I've hand raised him! He is very intelligent and has an excellent vocabulary. Excellent talker! When he want's me he yells MAMAAAAA! He knows what he is saying and he knows when he is good and bad. He laughs really loud when he does something bad. My Blue and Gold Macaw will laugh really loud when she sees that he's in trouble. NEVER a dull moment in our house! These are great birds as pets, but stores that sale them don't tell you the health problems that come because they are crossbred. Really excellent pets stores will not sell any crossbreed birds as they know the problems that can arise! My Harlequin Macaw is one of many with health problems and it's not a pretty site when he is sick or has a serious allergy reaction to his foods. The Vet bills can become very costly. Please be educated on these birds, know what you are dealing with. These guys live 80 plus years. I hope the rest of you have very healthy Harlequins.

Me and my boyfriend got a Harlequin macaw off the buy and sell about two months ago. We love im to death he's so playful. His name is Ruben and he waz suppost to be my boyfriend's pet but he likes me more. At first i didn't want anything to do with him, he just scared me at first but now i wouldn't get rid of him for anything. I'm glad my boyfriend bought him.. If anyone is looking into getting a parrot then i suggest you get a Harlequin macaw they are very frindly and playful and make good pets. As long as you are willing to spend at least four hours a day with them, well, all i can say is he is the greatest bird in the world....

Update: McKala now has a harness to go outside with me. She is enjoying the walks with me and seeing the neighbors who seem to enjoy seeing her outside and up close. I purchased the harness from the Hartman Aviary and find that it was the easiest to put on and take off as it was all one part. I have also purchased another one for my other birds so that the Hahn's, sengal, & conure can all enjoy the outsides. I really enjoy being around my birds and I wanted them to experience the outdoors. It sure makes owning a bird more fun. Also, she is talking much more, says come here, up, and is working on how are you. I really do enjoy McKala.

Why a bird? I have heard that question more than once and by different people. After my last cat died I was upset over it. I get that way after all my companion friends die. I have had several in my life and I really hate when I loose them. After a year or so, my wife and I talked about getting something. She wanted a dog, I would of liked another cat. I spent some time on a farm and cats where all over keeping the rodents in check. My dad always had dogs and I have nothing against them, just wasn’t what I wanted to commit myself too. After seeing macaws in Hawaii we were attracted to them. My wife always liked to go over when they were on display in the hotels and try and get them to say something. I always liked those bright colors and just the size of them fascinated me. Also the ability to talk always caught my interest. I spent some time on the internet learning about them. Found out they are highly intelligent and make great companions if you are able to commit yourself to a long term companionship since these guys live 50-75 years or more. They are also demanding of your time. If you can deal with the consolations you will have to make then these parrots are a good choice. Of course I didn’t just wake up one morning and say to my wife “lets go get a macaw”. We actually went to look at kittens, but the vet was closed after noon on Saturdays. What worked in my favor was that there is a place about 20 minutes from me called “Bird Paradise”. This place is awesome. The people that run this place really do love the birds and it shows in how they do business. We went in just to look and were amazed at how many exotic birds they had in house. After spending quite awhile looking I found a blue and gold macaw that really seemed to like me. Unfortunately he was sold. In-fact all of the macaws were sold. It seems the breeding season is in the spring. I was a little beside myself in hearing this but was told that there was a baby harlequin that was still to young to be put in with the others. They asked me if I wanted to see her and of course I said yes. They brought out a little baby with feathers only on her head and on the top of her winds, nowheres else. She was brought out in a little basket. She was so cute, trying to flap her wings and squawking, mainly because she was scared. I really didn’t know how to hold her or anything but just leaving her in the basket and rubbing her head she calmed down and slowly fell asleep. She was so cool. I really can’t explain it, she just was. My wife felt the same way but also liked to go and visit all the bigger birds on display. After a while the staff came over and talked to us about her. Showed us the vet papers giving her a clean bill of health and the vaccination records. Also showed the DNA records stating she was a female. I can’t say how long we were there but eventually we left without making a decision on getting her or not. She was not cheap. The staff told us that we should go think about it and if we wanted her to just call them with a credit card number and that we needed only put down 500 dollars. I wanted her but my wife wasn’t sure. After leaving we went out to eat and decided to get her. After getting home I called and gave them a credit card number. I’m glad I did that. Macaws don’t last long there without being sold. After acquiring her we had to give her a name. Now since she will out live us, I didn’t want to give her just a name with no real thought behind it, so we went through a website that had what seems like thousands of names. Finally we agreed on Jasmine. After 5 months of calling her this, I still think it was a good choice. Well I wrote the above sections in mid January, 2007. I saved it and never went back to it till I just came upon it today Sept. 4, 07. My wife and I have had Jasmine a while spending time and taking care of her. We brought her home February 15, 07. She had a little problem the first few days getting used to her new home. First I didn’t get her a cage that was as big as required. Close but not big enough. I ended up buying her a cage that is 3 ft by 4 ft by 7 ft high. I used the old cage outside on our patio and when we go out and spend time there, Jasmine either goes in the cage or we let her climb on the top. Her wings are clipped so she really can’t fly far and she knows it so she doesn’t try much. When we brought her home we have her cage in the living room where we spend most of our time. I was told she needs to be within sight of her flock and really needs to be close to us whenever she can. So the cage went in the living room. Unfortunately she didn’t get very much sleep. Always being to nosey to sleep. I read that parrots need a good nights sleep or they get behavior problems. We felt it would be better if she slept upstairs in the spare bedroom. So another third cage was bought. Something that was big enough for her to just sleep in, yet small enough to fit through normal doorways without taking the cage apart if we had company sleep over. This worked well. She is afraid of the dark, according to my wife. The jury is still out for me though. Jasmine also didn’t eat enough and weight gain is something that every parrot needs. Ours of course had issues with eating. She just didn’t want to eat most things we fed her. We fed her all kinds of food from the bird store plus we cooked her food. We tried all kinds of vegetables. She started to learn that this stuff was food and started to eat it. Parrots will eat meat and our girl just loves chicken. She loves to remove the meat from a bone and then crack the bone open and dig out the marrow. She also loves corn on the cob. She gets finicky from time to time when it comes to what vegetables she will eat on any given day. Somedays she likes peas, some days she doesn’t. This is the way she is on a lot of foods. Parrots like to eat with their flock so I built her a T stand with food and water bowls built into it. We feed her on that at dinner time and roll it into the dining room so she can eat with us. She looks forward to that. In the morning my wife gives her all the nuts and dried fruits that we buy at the bird store and a separate bowl full of fresh vegetables and fruits that we buy at the grocery store. Of course she gets a fresh bowl full of water. For some reason she won’t touch water if its “old”. She eats in her cage in the morning since both of us work. Of course we spoil her and have all kinds of toys for her to play with. She loves to destroy her wooden toys. Parrots love to chew and she is no exception. She loves to chew on everything. That is one reason you can’t let them just roam around unsupervised. She has no problem chewing on a electrical cord or a very expensive dining room set. Or anything that catches her eye. And very little is missed. She notices most everything and wants to investigate. That usually means chewing. She has been known to pull my wife's diamonds out of her ear and snap off buttons on her blouse in one quick swoop. Its something that I’m sure all parrot owners go though on a daily basis. We bought her a leash to go around her so we can walk her around the neighborhood on nice days. She really likes that. She used to really fight us on putting on the leash. She would bite and run and move her head back and fourth so you couldn’t get this thing over her head. But as time went on and she learned that we were going for a walk she really doesn’t fight that much. Usually just moving her head a little to make you work for it. The neighborhood folks see us and probably think we are weird walking around with a bird on our arms or shoulders but birds like to walk around and see new things just like dogs. Jasmine is just a few weeks over a year old and she still only says “hello”. She only says it when she feels like it but when she starts she will say it for some time. She doesn’t use it in context yet but today when I walked in the door, she said hello. So of course I had to give her a head rub for that. She loves her head rubs. She can’t get enough of them. It’s weird but she can sit on your lap or stomach and she will start scratching her head to try and tell you that is what she wants. Then all you do is start preening her. You can rub her head just right and she will start to fall asleep. I call her a cuddle whore. She loves to cuddle. I don’t know if that is normal for a macaw but they tell me its what cockatoos do. So I guess I have a cockatoo in a macaw’s body. You can usually tell when Jasmine wants to go to bed. She starts looking up at her bedroom and if you put her on the floor will usually make a bee line for the steps. She can climb those steps very quickly. It is funny to watch her run up those steps. Now mind you she can’t get down them but up she can go up. My wife usually feeds her cedar nuts in a bowl up in the bedroom. I wish Jasmine would do that while she is down here messing around on her java tree or while she is either in or on her cage. I worry a little about this because when we take her back to the bird place to board her while we are on vacation, she will not get that specialized attention and possibly loss some weight. All in all raising a macaw is like raising a kid. She wants to get into everything and you can’t turn you back on them for long. When she gets something in her head, she will not be denied. A little to head strong for me but I might as well get used to it and try to break her of that as time goes on. One more thing about her is that she likes to take showers. Not in our bathroom like some parrots do but outside from a hose with a mister spray nozzle. She will sit there and flap her wings while she squawks and gets soaked. It will take her all day to dry completely but she likes it. Since she is in the middle of a molt, maybe the water helps somehow. I wonder what the next six months will bring and what new discoveries both Jasmine and us will encounter.

We are owned by a 13 year precocious, mischeivious, hilarious, bratty harlequin. She's got a great sense of humor and rules this roost. We love her madly. Great creature, but .......VERY high maintenance. While quite lively and entertaining, they require--no, demand-- a great deal of time, care and attention. It's like having a 4 year old under foot at all times. This includes both the good and bad behaviors. So if you aren't ready to engage in a full time relationship, this is not the bird for you. That being said our little "monster" (her name is Spanish for a mythical boogie man monster) is truly a great addition to our family. FYI: we do not have children in our home. She knows all our cats by name and calls for them. Often telling on them when they have done something wrong. Or blaming them for something she has done wrong. One afternoon she had opened up the lock on her cage and quietly ventured into the bathroom where she proceeded to chew off an entire corner of the door! Created a hole the size of a large fat cat. When I found her, I said "What happened here?" She said, "The kitties." Recently we had to travel overnight and left her alone. Mind you, overnight only. She was stocked up with plenty of food, water, toys and classical music playing softly. When we got home, she had no voice. We took her to the vet to be sure she wasn't sick. She wasn't. As it turns out she screamed herself hoarse. Needless to say we enjoyed the respite from the earsplitting noise she shares with us.

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Author: Clarice Brough, CAS

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