Rainbow Lorikeet

BirdAustralia

17 Jun

Trichoglossus moluccanus

Rainbow lorikeets travel in nomadic flocks, following the flowering of trees — using their brush-tipped tongues to feed on nectar and pollen. At night, they roost communally, perching close together and occasionally hanging upside down or lying on their backs, feet in the air.

The Aussie Bird Count is an annual event held during October — spring, in Australia, when birds are most active and visible — in which participants spend 20 minutes spotting and counting birds in an area near their homes. That data, sent in by tens of thousands of people, contributes to our knowledge of the distribution and number of local bird species. Since the event began in 2014, one bird has topped the list for 11 consecutive years as the most-seen bird in all of Australia: the rainbow lorikeet.

A Most Colourful Bird

It's quite the bird to see, for if any ave deserves to be named after a rainbow, it's this parrot. The rainbow lorikeet packs a lot of colour into a small frame — only reaching a length of about 30 centimetres (12 in), from its curved red beak to the tips of its streamlined tail feathers. Indeed, it's among the most colourful birds in the world. Its head and underbelly are a purplish-blue. Its breast is a fiery red, fringed with orange and yellow. Its back, wings, and tail are cloaked in verdant green and a light-lime collar adorns the nape of its neck. Its eyes glow bright red, almost menacing if it weren't for the lorikeet's otherwise jovial appearance. And, unlike many bird species, in which the males hog all colour and pomp, both sexes of the rainbow lorikeet are equally scintillating.

The lorikeet's rainbow plumage is a reflection of its colourful diet. It feasts on a botanical kaleidoscope of flowers — spindly and spider-like pink grevilleas, brushlike yellow banksias, red bottlebrushes, and a multi-coloured fare of eucalyptus flowers. It's like the lorikeet dons a delicate outfit made from these petals. Its genus name, Trichoglossus, combines the Ancient Greek thrix meaning "hair" and glōssa meaning "tongue" — "hairy tongue" is an apt description of the lorikeet's oddly unnerving appendage. Specialised for a flowery diet, the tip of its tongue is covered in papillae; we have them too, as tiny bumps, but the lorikeet's papillae are far longer and grouped together to form a kind of bristle brush that it uses to sweep up pollen grains. It also indulges in a flower's nectar, spending some 70% of its time feeding, able to visit 30-40 eucalyptus ﬂowers in a single minute.

As daylight is sapped by the oncoming dusk, flocks of rainbow lorikeets gather high in tree canopies to roost. They can be seen in the hundreds, accompanied by other species of colourful lorikeets, together forming psychedelic tapestries in the tree-tops. They give sharp, screeching warnings as they fly in to roost and bicker loudly over good sleeping spots. Those at rest twitter softly to one another. Holding firm, a rainbow lorikeet can hang vertically, or upside down, from a branch for hours at a time. Some sleep on their backs, their feet sticking straight up into the air. Come nighttime, the cacophonous lorikeets fall into quiet slumber.

Not All Sunshine and Rainbows

The world over, invasive species wreak havoc on native fauna and human livelihoods — we often call them pests. But even a native animal, if it's numerous and disruptive enough, if it garners enough contempt, can gain the notorious status of pest. Case in point, the rainbow lorikeet.

Rainbow lorikeets gather in gregarious congregations wherever there are trees: from rainforests to woodlands, and even (or rather especially) urban parks and gardens. The rainbow lorikeet's specific name is moluccanus, coined by a German naturalist who mistakenly believed the species came from the Moluccas, an archipelago in the eastern part of Indonesia. The rules of taxonomy being what they are, the name has stuck, even though the rainbow lorikeet is very much an Australian bird, native to the eastern seaboard from northern Queensland to South Australia.

While the rainbow lorikeet has topped every list since the Aussie Bird Count began, it wasn’t always the country’s most common ave. Its presence around Sydney, for example, has waxed and waned and waxed again. Historically, these lorikeets appeared to be doing well before their numbers dropped in the 19th century, becoming somewhat rare. Then, in the 1950s, these rainbow birds made their resurgence, proliferating to become a staple sight throughout the city, and thriving til the present day.

But, as the rainbow lorikeets expanded their range, they became invaders in their own homeland. The lorikeets themselves can hardly be blamed. In the 1960s, a captive population of rainbow lorikeets either escaped or was released near the University of Western Australia in Perth (the capital city of Western Australia, a region covering the entire western third of the country). These founding lorikeets, likely no more than 10, became abundant in the city and spread to the surrounding areas. In 1984, the estimated population in Perth increased to 54 individuals. By 1994 there were thought to be over 1,000. The next year, they multiplied to 2,000. Since their introduction to Western Australia in the 1960s, the rainbow lorikeet population has risen from less than 10 individuals to over 40,000. An exponential explosion.¹

So, the rainbow lorikeet is certainly prolific, but how much damage can these little birds really do? Anybody who's had one as a pet will know of a parrot's potential for disorder and destruction. And because of the rainbow's social disposition, its destructive power is multiplied by the size of its flock. Flocks typically number less than 50 individuals, but, occasionally, turnouts of over 1,000 occur. Converging en masse on an abundant food source, say an orchard, a large gathering of lorikeets can quickly turn abundance into scarcity as they strip all the trees of fresh fruit and, as a token of thanks, leave behind copious amounts of fresh droppings. But it's not just humans who have reason to complain — other birds, the rainbow lorikeet's avian neighbours, have it much worse.

The rainbow lorikeet is a fecund breeder. It makes its nest in the hollow of a eucalyptus tree or another hole of some kind. There it lays a clutch of two eggs, which seems meagre but it's only one of three or more clutches the lorikeet can lay in a single year. So a rainbow lorikeet spends much of the year breeding and a breeding pair of lorikeets is an exceptionally competitive and territorial duo. Competition for food can be fierce and lorikeets often aggressively dominate food sources, leaving other bird species with scraps. In some places, the traditionally vegetarian (and occasionally insectivorous), lorikeets have even developed a taste for flesh — people have reported seeing minced meat, left out for magpies and kookaburras, being gorged on by pairs of these colourful lorikeets (probably not the healthiest food for nectar and pollen specialists). Competition for nesting sites is just as intense, if not more so. Rainbow lorikeets, in a dark turn unbefitting of their jolly attire, have been seen dragging other parrots' chicks out of tree hollows and claiming the nests as their own. Additionally, with a habit of roosting alongside other species, the rainbow lorikeet is a potential vector for spreading avian diseases.

Larrikin Lorikeets

Adaptable as rainbow lorikeets are, they suffer as much as they benefit from an increasingly human-centred world. Resource scarcity and foreign foliage have afflicted the birds with an odd, paralysing illness. Every year in southeast Queensland and northeast New South Wales (Australia's east coast), thousands of rainbow lorikeets fall victim to Lorikeet Paralysis Syndrome (LPS) — they become paralysed, unable to eat or fly, and usually die from dehydration and starvation. The condition is treatable but requires several weeks of intensive care before a lorikeet regains its health. In the spring and summer of 2023, an animal charity in Queensland (RSPCA Qld) treated over 3,000 lorikeets, the vast majority of which had LPS.

The source of the illness is currently unknown, but the biggest clue is its seasonality: it occurs only between October and June, and most devastatingly from December to February. This suggests that the cause is probably some kind of plant that only blooms from spring to autumn and that the illness results from poisoning following its consumption. It may be the case that, in the fierce contest for resources, when there isn't enough of their typical fare, the lorikeets have to rely on strange foods (as they have with meat), maybe even introduced plants which could have odd effects on their physiology. An investigation to find the botanical culprit is underway.

In the northern parts of Australia, around the city of Darwin, the lorikeets have a different issue: annual bouts of drunkenness. Every year, as the wet season approaches, flocks of rainbow lorikeets begin to flap about clumsily, bump into things, and attempt to socialise with humans. As with other cases of animal drunkenness, the lorikeets are thought to get their booze from over-ripened, fermenting fruit — although the exact fruit isn't known. If these were just cases of heavy inebriation, they would perhaps be quite humorous. However, the lorikeets typically remain plastered for several days in a row, as if on a self-destructive bender, much longer than expected if their condition was solely alcohol-induced. The birds also display other symptoms in addition to drunkenness, such as respiratory problems and unusual discharge from their eyes, nose, and mouth. The current consensus is that these yearly bacchanalias result from intoxication by way of fermented fruit, concurrent with some kind of virus. Not a great combination for one's health and self-preservation.

The rainbow lorikeet is a bird of contradictions. It is beautiful, boisterous, smart, and social. It's also a ruthless neighbour to other native parrots and a menace to our crops and public spaces. It certainly has a complicated relationship with humans — as both a beloved pet and a detested pest. It can be potty trained and taught tricks, it can mimic voices and learn to solve complex problems. It also screams incessantly, shoves other birds from feeders, and gets belligerently drunk. Opinions are, understandably, divided on this larrikin lorikeet. Not that it cares what we think.

¹ Rainbow lorikeets have also crossed the Bass Strait to Tasmania where their presence has caused quite the panic. Not native to the island, the first colourful sightings were recorded in the 1840s and 1850s. Now flocks of hundreds are being spotted across the state, with the total Tasmanian population still unknown. The main concern is their impact on agriculture, given the lorikeets' habit of raiding orchards, and their impact on Tasmanian natives like musk lorikeets, which are capable of interbreeding with the rainbow invaders.

**Where Does It Live?**

⛰️ Rainforests, woodlands, and urban areas with enough trees.
📍 From northern Queensland, across the eastern seaboard, to South Australia. Introduced around Perth (Western Australia) and to Tasmania.

‘Least Concern’ as of 15 Jan, 2024.

IUCN

Size // Small
Length // 25 - 30 cm (9.8 - 11.8 in)
Weight // 100 - 150 g (3.5 to 5.5 oz)
Activity: Diurnal ☀️
Lifestyle: Social 👥
Lifespan: Up to 25 or 30 years
Diet: Herbivore (+some insects)
Favorite Food: Flower nectar 🌺
Class: Aves
Order: Psittaciformes
Family: Psittaculidae
Genus: Trichoglossus
Species: T. moluccanus

Since the Aussie Bird Count began in 2014, the rainbow lorikeet has topped the list as the most-seen bird in Australia for 11 consecutive years in a row.
Its colourful look mirrors its colourful diet. It drinks nectar and eats pollen from spiky pink grevilleas, golden banksias, bright red bottlebrushes, and eucalyptus flowers. The lorikeet’s bristled tongue is perfectly adapted to gathering these floral delights.
These lorikeets forage in large flocks, spending around 70% of their day feeding, travelling more than 48 km (30 mi) a day for food, with some lorikeets visiting up to 650 flowers a day.
But these birds aren’t all rainbows and sunshine. Introduced to Perth in the 1960s, a handful of rainbow lorikeets exploded into a population of over 40,000. Aggressive and noisy, they raid crops and push out other birds. In some areas, rainbow lorikeets have taken a dark turn unbefitting of their colourful attire — they've been seen pulling other birds’ chicks from tree hollows to claim nests as their own.
Each year, thousands of lorikeets along Australia's east coast suffer from a strange illness called Lorikeet Paralysis Syndrome. They become paralysed and often die, likely from toxins in foreign flowers they eat.
While in Darwin, rainbow lorikeets suffer another odd affliction — they get drunk. They gorge on fermenting fruit during the wet season, staggering about clumsily and bumping into things, seemingly inebriated for days (possibly affected by a virus at the same time).