Palm cockatoo

CAPTURING BOTH THE beauty and individuality of Australia’s crested parrots provided an exquisite challenge for renowned bird artist Ego Guiotto in 2005 when he created a poster celebrating all

14 of our cockatoo species. Dominating his artwork of this avian group, which includes all hues of cockatoo, the corellas and the cockatiel and galah, was the rarely encountered palm cockatoo. In Australia, this regal and imposing species is limited to the tip of Cape York in far north Queensland and also occurs in Papua New Guinea. Palm cockatoos have been observed drumming on hollow tree branches using short sticks in a rare example of avian tool use that’s thought to be a territorial display.