Red-cheeked Parrot

Geoffroyus geoffroyi

Johann Matthäus Bechstein was the first to describe the species, in 1811.

Both scientific names honour French zoologist Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire.

Roland Green, Geoffroyus maclennani (Red-cheeked Parrot) 1917 (adult male, top; adult female, below)

Author’s note:Talented natural history collector William Rae McLennan heard about the Red-cheeked Parrot while collecting on Cape York between 1910 and 1912. He sought out the species and sent a pair to his employer, naturalist Dr John MacGillivray, who described it as a new species (Geoffroyus maclennani). MacGillivray did not know that it had already been described and named from specimens from Indonesia, where it also occurs.

Neville W. Cayley, Red-cheeked Parrot (Geoffroyus geoffroyi) 1930s (adult female, top; adult male, centre; immature, bottom)

Author’s note: The Red-cheeked Parrot is a fast-flying, fruit- and flower-eating parrot of central eastern Cape York. Like the Eclectus Parrot, its Australian range is at the southernmost tip of its stronghold, centred on Papua New Guinea and Indonesia.