New findings of birds in paleontological and archaeological contexts of Cuba

With great excitement here I announce the publication of another contribution to the archaeology and paleontology of the island of Cuba. On this occasion as a collaborator to Osvaldo Jimenez, zooarchaeologist, a specialist from the Office of the Historian of the City of Havana, Cuba. Our paper came out today on the scientific journal Novitates Caribaea, available here:

https://novitatescaribaea.do/index.php/novitates/article/view/251

https://doi.org/10.33800/nc.vi17.251 

We take this opportunity to extend our thanks to Roger Arrazcaeta Delgado, Raúl Mesa Morales, Marcos A. Acosta Mauri, Gabinete de Arqueología, Oficina del Historiador de La Habana (OHH), Jorge A. Garcell Domínguez, Consejo Nacional de Patrimonio Cultural (CNPC); William Suárez Duque, P.O. Box 16477, West Palm Beach, Florida 33165, USA.; S. L. Olson, Megan Spitzer y Christina A. Gebhard, Division of Birds, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC, USA; Peter Capainolo, Division of Birds, American Museum of Natural History, New York, USA.

Arredondo´s owl (Pulsatrix arredondoi). 

Bilingual abstract: 

 This paper provides new records on Cuban birds such as the endemic Cuban macaw (Ara tricolor), found in two archaeological sites in Old Havana dated in the 17th and 18th centuries. We provide details on Arredondo´s owl (Pulsatrix arredondoi), extinct since prehistory, but whose remains have been collected in two caves near Las Charcas, a community in San José de las Lajas municipality, Mayabeque province. The report also includes the ivory-billed woodpecker (Campephilus principalis), from a specimen collected in Cueva del Aguacate in the above-cited location. The bone remains found in Cueva de Las Charcas match a paleontological context, but the other was found in la Cueva de los Muertos, an archaic culture archaeological site (i.e., hunter-fisher-gatherers). The possibility that P. arredondoi formed part of this pre-Columbian aboriginal’s diet is considered. The record of C. principalis represents the first finding of this species in paleontological contexts in Cuba. Information on the natural history of the species is moreover provided. 

Spanish:

 Se comentan nuevos registros de aves de Cuba, como el guacamayo cubano (Ara tricolor), hallado en dos sitios arqueológicos de La Habana Vieja, de los siglos XVII y XVIII, asimismo, el búho de Arredondo (Pulsatrix arredondoi), ave extinta en tiempos prehistóricos, cuyos restos hemos colectado en dos cuevas de la comunidad Las Charcas, municipio San José de las Lajas, provincia Mayabeque, y por último, el carpintero real (Campephilus principalis), colectado en la Cueva del Aguacate, sitio localizado también en la comunidad Las Charcas. El resto óseo de P. arredondoi colectado en la Cueva de Las Charcas procede de un contexto paleontológico. En cambio, el otro resto proviene de la Cueva de los Muertos, que es un sitio arqueológico de aborígenes arcaicos, también conocidos como apropiadores mesolíticos. Por vez primera se considera la posibilidad de que P. arredondoi formara parte de la dieta de los aborígenes precolombinos citados. El registro de C. principalis representa el primer hallazgo de esta especie en contextos paleontológicos de Cuba. Adicionalmente se aporta información novedosa sobre la historia natural de las especies tratadas. 

 Citation: 

 Jiménez, O. & Orihuela, J. (2021) «Nuevos hallazgos de aves en contextos paleontológicos y arqueológicos de Cuba», Novitates Caribaea, (17), pp. 163-176. doi: 10.33800/nc.vi17.251.

Ara tricolor: Cuba's extinct endemic macaw

Up to 150 years ago Cuba possessed three parrots in its avifauna-one of them a large and beautifully colored macaw.



Watercolor of the Cuban macaw Ara tricolor circa 1800 by Jacques Barraband,
a French zoological illustrator. From the Cuban macaw Wikipedia.

 

Parrots belong to the bird family Psittacidae, of which Cuba has two representative genera and species: the endangered Cuban conure Psittacara eups (=Aratinga), and the better widespread Cuban parrot Amazona leucocephala. Up to the mid-XIX, Cuba also had a large macaw, Ara tricolor. The last known pair was shot in 1864 at La Vega, in the Cienaga de Zapata-the largest wetland swamp of the Caribbean archipelago. The ornithologists Johannes Gundlach and C. B. Cory believed that this species survived up until the later XIX century. In Spanish, these large parrots are known as guacamayos, which is the Arawak indian name, or papagayos, the Castilian.



Oil on canvas: "A moorhen, a gull, and a Scarlet Macaw by a stream in a landscape" by Philip Reinagle
circa early XIX century.

Scientist recognize that other large Ara macaws existed in other islands of the Caribbean, but the Cuban macaw is the only one known from complete specimens, preserved as stuffed, mounted, or skins, and several skeletal parts found in paleontological and archaeological deposits.



Painting of Ara tricolor by Francois-Nicolas Martinet, in 1765.

Colonists that came to the island after Columbus’s rediscovery of the New World, documented the massive killings of these birds by amerindians, but mostly by conquistadors, who used them for food, plumage, or kept them as pets. In one occasion, Father Bartolome de las Casas records a mass killing of macaws at the indian town of Casaharta in 1513 by the natives for the sake of the colonists:

“[my translation] …the many things marvelous and abundance of food from many sources, bread and game, and fish, but above all of macaws, which if I have not forgotten, during the 15 days that we were there, at least 10,000 macaws were eaten. These were of the most beautiful in the world, which was a real shame to see them killed. Even the little native kids would climb trees to catch them…”

 

Las Casas also recorded the presence of a “different” macaw, with a white, not red, forehead on the island of Hispaniola. He mentions that when Columbus reached the island of Cuba, “nice, green macaws” were gifted to him by the natives (Las Casas, 1875:296, vol. 1). The colonists accepted these gifts, and many macaws were sacrificed for their beautiful feathers, which were to be sent to Spain as exotic souvenirs. 

 

Mounted specimen of the Cuban macaw from the RMNH.
Naturalis Biodiversity Center.

 

It seems, by these accounts, that the Caribbean amerindians were also fond of keeping parrot pets. Yet still, during these early years of the conquest, “there were so many flocks of parrots, that they covered the sun”. This was not to last past the colonial era.

 

Illustration by the Cuban zoological illustrator Otton A. Suarez (1974) from
Las Aves de Cuba: Especies Endemicas (1980) by Orlando A. Garrido.
This is the same specimen from the Institute of Ecology and Systematics, in Havana, below.

The causes of its final extinction are closely tied to human pressure: overhunting at first, and later, deforestation for agricultural development, most intensified during the XVIII and early XIX. During this time, the king’s preserves of forests were maintained and untouched until then by Real decree and accessed only illegally or under special grant by the king. But with the massive onset of agriculture deforestation for tobacco and sugar cane plantations likely drove these large birds to the few remaining forests of the island, Cienaga de Zapata being one of them, and one of the most protected even now. It was at these locations that a few naturalists secured the last specimens, treasures of American and European museums. Sadly, the only surviving mounted skin of Ara tricolor in Cuba was recently stolen from the Institute of Ecology and Systematics (IES) in the outskirts of the city of Havana. This was a gorgeous well-preserved specimen collected by Johannes Gundlach, and one of the most treasured specimens of the old Academy of Sciences, which are now housed at the Institute.

 

Cuban macaw Ara tricolor from the National Museum
of IES in Havana, Cuba.
This specimen has been recently lost or stolen.
Courtesy of A. Tejedor.

 

These rare representatives of Cuban macaws belong in museums, were they are taken care by specialists, people who have studied their whole lives to preserve specimens such as these, and where they are kept under special conditions, and where they can be studied by those that are interested. They do not belong in some collector’s cabinet. It is only hoped that the final itinerary of this specimen is secured, and that the collector protects the beautiful mounted specimen with the dignity it deserves-for the rarity it represents, and as a reminder of the vulnerability of the Earth’s fauna before human destructiveness.

 

Bibliography


De Las Casas, Bartolomé (1560/1875). Historia de las Indias. Vol. 1-4. Imprenta de Miguel Ginesta (Press), Madrid.

Gundlach, J. C. 1876. Contribución a la ornitología cubana. Imprenta La Antilla, La Habana, 364 pp.

Gundlach, J. C. 1893. Ornitología cubana. Imprenta La Moderna, La Habana, 357 pp.

Wetmore, A. (1928). Bones of birds from the Ciego Montero deposit of Cuba. American Museum Novitates 301: 1-5.

Wiley, James W. and G. M. Kirwan (2013). The extinct macaws of the West Indies, with special reference to Cuban macaw Ara tricolor. Bulletin of the British Ornithologists’ Club 132 (2):125-156.