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DESCRIPTION 16 inches (41cm). Green, with black collar, beak band and stripe between nostrils and eyes. Red shine behind collar. Yellowish-green belly and undertail coverts, bluish-green tail feathers with yellow tips. Eyes yellow-orange, beak red, legs black. Immatures resemble adult hen, but have greenish irises and paler bills. Well-known mutations include lutino (sex-linked); blue (autosomal recessive); albino (formed from lutino and blue); cinnamon (or isabelle); grey (dominant when paired to normal). Species may have been known to Alexander the Great (356323 BC). The related, but larger, Alexandrine Parakeet (P. eupatria) in fact bears his name. Apart from variation in size, only plumage distinction is that Alexandrines also have red shoulder patches.
NATURAL DISTRIBUTION Covers wider area than any other species of psittacine, from northwest Africa through Asia as far east as Burma, and into China. Introduced to many other localities.
HABITAT Ringneck Parakeet likes gardens, parks, farmland, woodland and timbered areas and lowland of Sri Lanka. Sometimes in flocks of about 15,000. Likes to bathe in the rain. Flocks split up during breeding season, each pair nesting in a tree cavity after courtship ritual: female twitters and rolls eyes at strutting male, rubs bills with him and accepts food. Even so, no firm pair bonding. Female dominates.
DIET Ringneck Parakeet eat Ripening fruit, grain (will even invade grainstores, opening sacks with hooked bills and squabbling over spoils), parrot mixture, greenstuff and non-fatty seeds.
SPECIAL NEEDS Generous aviary, 12 to 16 feet (4 to 5m) long, because reportedly males in small areas become sterile. Young independent birds should be placed in roomy flight. Tolerates light frost, but provide temperate, protected area.
CAGE LIFE Ideal aviary pet, may talk well and can live for more than half a century. Possible to keep colonies. Lays 3 to 6 white eggs, incubation 22 to 26 days by female, fledging 45 to 52 days. Female starts nest inspection early in the year and will build the nest in about three days. She chews the wood shavings and chips placed in the nest box (10 X 10 X 16 inches/25 X 25 X 40cm, entrance diameter 3 inches/8cm) into shape. Male feeds both female and chicks; hen helps feed after a week.
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