Scientists work to save wild Puerto Rican parrot after Hurricane Maria
EL YUNQUE, Puerto Rico — Biologists are trying to save the last of the endangered Puerto Rican parrots after more than half the population of the bright-green birds with turquoise-tipped wings disappeared when Hurricane Maria hit Puerto Rico and destroyed their habitat and food sources.
In the tropical forest of El Yunque, only two of the 56 wild birds that once lived there survived the Category 4 storm that pummeled the U.S. territory in September 2017. Meanwhile, only four of 31 wild birds in a forest in the western town of Maricao survived, along with 75 out of 134 wild parrots living in the Rio Abajo forest in the central mountains of Puerto Rico, scientists said.