"As populations grow, possibly ñandúes will intermingle across borders, making a stronger, unified population. This in turn is one step closer to a rewilded South America."
#rewilding #chile #argentina #patagonia #birds #wildlife #southamerica
https://www.rewildingmag.com/returning-flightless-nandues-to-their-chilean-home/
Keel-billed Toucan Ramphastos sulfuratus
Keel-billed Toucan Ramphastos sulfuratus
IUCN Red List Status: Near Threatened
Locations: Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia, Venezuela
Found in tropical rainforests and lowland jungles from southern Mexico through Central America to north-western South America.
The Keel-billed #Toucan, with their dazzling rainbow-coloured bills and bold black-and-yellow plumage, are one of the most iconic #birds of Central and #SouthAmerica. Listed as Near Threatened on the IUCN Red List, this species of spectacular #bird is facing steady declines due to #palmoil #soy and #meat #deforestation, #hunting, and capture for the illegal pet trade. The destruction of humid forest canopies — especially for cattle grazing and monocultures like palm oil — is pushing this vibrant forest specialist closer to extinction. Protect the colourful creatures of the Amazonian rainforest canopies! Every time you shop be #vegan and #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife
Showing up with a riot of colour and croaking, Keel-billed #Toucans 🌈✨🦜 are nature’s works of art. Help them survive against #palmoil and meat #deforestation in #Colombia and #Guatemala. Be #vegan and #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2026/04/05/keel-billed-toucan-ramphastos-sulfuratus/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterIconic #birds of #Venezuela 🇻🇪 #Mexico 🇲🇽 #Honduras 🇭🇳 Keel-billed #Toucans are rainbow flocks of rainforest joy! 🦜🐦🪽 Help them survive be #vegan and call out #poaching and the illegal pet trade #Boycottpalmoil 🌴❌ #Boycott4Wildlife @palmoildetect https://palmoildetectives.com/2026/04/05/keel-billed-toucan-ramphastos-sulfuratus/
Share to BlueSky Share to TwitterAppearance & Behaviour
The Keel-billed Toucan is impossible to miss. They are strikingly colourful birds, with black plumage, a vivid yellow throat, crimson tail-tip, and turquoise legs. Their oversized, multi-hued bill — lime green, orange, and cherry red — can reach up to 15 cm long but remains surprisingly lightweight thanks to a hollow keratin structure.
Highly social, they travel in small groups of 6 to 12 individuals, calling to each other with croaks and yelps as they glide between trees. They nest and sleep in tight tree cavities, often tucking their beaks and tails under their bodies to conserve space and heat. Recent research also shows they can detect fruit using their sense of smell — a rare trait in birds, highlighting their complex foraging behaviour.
Threats
Deforestation for agriculture and cattle ranching
Throughout their range, particularly in Mexico, Honduras, and Colombia, large areas of tropical rainforest are being cleared for cattle grazing, soy plantations, and subsistence farming. These forest clearances remove vital canopy nesting trees and reduce food availability, especially for highly frugivorous birds like the Keel-billed Toucan. Habitat fragmentation also isolates populations, reducing genetic diversity and increasing vulnerability to local extinction.
Palm oil and soy monocultures and forest degradation
Although not traditionally associated with Central America, palm oil cultivation is rapidly expanding in regions like Honduras, Guatemala, and Colombia. These monocultures replace biodiverse forests with uniform, sterile plantations where toucans cannot nest or forage effectively. The clearing of tropical forest for palm oil is often accompanied by illegal logging, fire, and pesticide use, further degrading the ecosystem. Loss of tree cavities and fruiting species is directly linked to toucan population declines.
Hunting for meat and beak trade
In rural regions, toucans are hunted for their meat and their colourful beaks, which are sold as ornaments or used in traditional ceremonies. Though this practice is illegal in many countries, weak enforcement allows it to persist. The slow flight and conspicuous colours of the Keel-billed Toucan make them easy targets. As mature adults are most often targeted, these killings reduce breeding success and destabilise family groups.
Capture for the illegal pet trade
The Keel-billed Toucan is a sought-after species in the illegal exotic bird trade. Chicks are taken from nests and sold in pet markets across Latin America, often dying during capture or transport. Adults are also captured and kept in cramped cages, where they frequently suffer from iron storage disease (hemochromatosis) due to improper diets. Online wildlife trafficking has made it easier for these birds to be bought and sold internationally with little oversight.
Climate change and drought-related food shortages
Shifting rainfall patterns and increased dry seasons caused by climate change are altering fruiting cycles in tropical forests. For a bird so reliant on fruit, this poses a serious threat. Prolonged droughts can lead to localised starvation and reduce breeding success. With fragmented forests unable to support movement between food-rich areas, toucan populations may collapse in drier regions over time.
Geographic Range
Keel-billed Toucans are found in: Mexico, Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama, Colombia and Venezuela. They inhabit humid tropical and subtropical rainforests, ranging from sea level to 1,500 metres. While they can forage in degraded forests and plantations, they rely on undisturbed primary canopy for nesting and social cohesion. Populations are becoming increasingly fragmented as deforestation escalates.
Diet
Keel-billed Toucans are frugivores, but opportunistically omnivorous. They consume a wide range of soft fruits, tossing them into the air to swallow whole. Their dextrous bills help them reach fruit on thin outer branches inaccessible to other birds.
Their diet also includes insects, small lizards, eggs, and nestlings. In studies conducted in Costa Rica, toucans were shown to actively use olfactory cues — specifically, the scent of ripe banana and papaya — to locate food, suggesting their sense of smell plays a more important role in foraging than previously believed.
Mating and Reproduction
Keel-billed Toucans nest in existing tree cavities, laying between 1 to 4 white eggs. Both male and female take turns incubating the eggs and feeding the chicks once they hatch. Chicks are born blind and featherless with thick heel pads to protect them in the pit-covered nests. They remain in the nest for 8–9 weeks until their bills fully develop and they are ready to fledge.
These birds breed once annually, timed with fruiting seasons in tropical forests. Family groups share parenting responsibilities and maintain long-term bonds, often engaging in bill jousting and food-sharing behaviours.
FAQs
How many Keel-billed Toucans are left in the wild?
The global population is estimated to be between 50,000 and 499,999 mature individuals (Partners in Flight, 2019). However, numbers are declining rapidly, with up to 20–29% projected loss in the next three generations due to habitat destruction and hunting (BirdLife International, 2020).
Where do Keel-billed Toucans live?
They live in humid tropical forests across Mexico, Central America, and northern South America, ranging as far south as Colombia and Venezuela. They prefer the canopy and upper midstorey of primary forests but are increasingly forced into degraded habitats.
Why are Keel-billed Toucans endangered?
They are primarily threatened by deforestation for agriculture, palm oil and cattle ranching, as well as illegal pet trade and hunting. Their populations are declining faster than tree cover loss alone would suggest, due to their sensitivity to forest degradation and reliance on cavity-nesting trees.
Do Keel-billed Toucans make good pets?
No. Capturing and caging toucans is cruel and drives illegal wildlife trade. They suffer from disease, stress, and a short lifespan in captivity. Keeping them as pets contributes to population decline and ecosystem collapse. If you love toucans, help protect them in the wild — never buy or share content encouraging exotic pet ownership.
Take Action!
Help save the Keel-billed Toucan from extinction. Never buy exotic birds or support facilities that trade in wild animals. Boycott palm oil, beef, and soy products. Support forest restoration and indigenous-led protection of tropical canopies. Raise your voice to defend one of the most colourful birds on Earth. #BoycottPalmOil #Boycott4Wildlife #Vegan #BoycottMeat
Support Keel-billed Toucans by going vegan and boycotting palm oil in the supermarket, it’s the #Boycott4Wildlife
Support the conservation of this species
This animal has no protections in place. Read about other forgotten species here. Create art to support this forgotten animal or raise awareness about them by sharing this post and using the #Boycottpalmoil #Boycott4Wildlife hashtags on social media. Also you can boycott palm oil in the supermarket.
Further Information
BirdLife International. 2021. Ramphastos sulfuratus. The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2021: e.T22682102A168670038. https://dx.doi.org/10.2305/IUCN.UK.2021-3.RLTS.T22682102A168670038.en. Accessed on 17 April 2025.
Hernández, M. C., Villada, A. M., & Barja, I. (2022). Onto the sense of smell in macaws, amazons and toucans: Can they use volatile cues of fruits to make foraging decisions? Integrative Zoology, 17(6), 1003–1020. https://doi.org/10.1111/1749-4877.12694
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Read more3. Supermarket sleuthing: Next time you’re in the supermarket, take photos of products containing palm oil. Share these to social media along with the hashtags to call out the greenwashing and ecocide of the brands who use palm oil. You can also take photos of palm oil free products and congratulate brands when they go palm oil free.
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Pledge your supportLearn about other animals endangered by palm oil and other agriculture
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Keep readingLearn about “sustainable” palm oil greenwashing
Read more about RSPO greenwashing
Lying Fake labels Indigenous Land-grabbing Human rights abuses Deforestation Human health hazardsA 2019 World Health Organisation (WHO) report into the palm oil industry and RSPO finds extensive greenwashing of palm oil deforestation and the murder of endangered animals (i.e. biodiversity loss)
Read more #animals #Belize #Bird #birds #Boycott4wildlife #BoycottMeat #BoycottPalmOil #bushmeat #Colombia #CostaRica #deforestation #ForgottenAnimals #Guatamala #Guatemala #Honduras #hunting #illegalPetTrade #KeelBilledToucanRamphastosSulfuratus #meat #Mexico #NearThreatenedSpecies #Nicaragua #PalmOil #palmOilDeforestation #palmoil #Panama #poaching #SouthAmerica #soy #Toucan #Toucans #vegan #Venezuela #vulnerable #VulnerableSpecies
ALL TOGETHER!
HOPE, LOVE & PEACE!
🪷🕊️💖✌🏻
https://youtu.be/W68-XaFepOg?si=jm9UyXZhStnj8n8_
#WARISOVER #STOPTHEWAR
#FLOWERPOWER
#Sudan #Israel #Gaza #Palestine
#Russia #Ukraine #Iran #worldwide
#global #news #Asia #Africa #Europe #NorthAmerica #SouthAmerica #Australia #activism
Where is the Honor? — ELN
“To take Cuba, that would be a great honor. To take Cuba, to take Cuba in some way, yes.” That’s what Trump said these days, but what does this guy understand by honor? Especially nowadays, when people talk about the right to honor; of course, that when the right was still respected. Today, that is a thing of the past, since both law and justice are matters defined by the whim of characters like Netan-IA-hu and Trump, where the opponent, or the alleged criminals, are killed in acts of war and without respecting codes or proving any guilt of the crimes they are accused of.The courts are changed not to battlefields, but to “target” shooting ranges. In times of war, honor becomes concrete and we warriors learn from our human nature the ethical codes that are built in each era, because the conqueror thinks one thing and the one who does not allow himself to be conquered thinks another; The same thing happens between the colonizer and the one who does not allow himself to be colonized; the exploiter and the one who resists being exploited. Simply put, it is an honor for the conqueror, colonizer or exploiter to take, to appropriate what he considers his. And for the counterpart of each of them it is an honor to defend themselves, resist or die.
It is said that honor in other times was an incentive or reward, this is how Trump understands it when he tries to keep Venezuela’s oil and other resources. It also talks about honor in the form and how the warrior or combatant faces the opponent; Of course, being a warrior in a powerful army that seeks to plunder a people is not the same as being part of an army of that poor and exploited people, without the powerful weapons and wealth to sustain it. It would be very good to fight as equals, one to one and with the same rules.
What honor can exist when the most powerful power in the world does not allow Cuba to even legally buy oil on the international market, when the United States wages wars to obtain or steal it? It’s the world upside down, but that’s reality. What honor can there be in the war of aggression that Israel and the United States are waging against Iran? The honor of two military powers to destroy a sovereign nation. More evident is the dishonor, if it can be said that way, of Trump in loudly requesting support from NATO and other countries to help him in this war against Iran. Where is the honor that Trump speaks of?
That is why Silvio Rodríguez’s response from Cuba is very beautiful, when he says: “I demand my AKM rifle.” There, yes, there is honor and a good one. There are thousands or tens or hundreds of thousands like him, where for them it is not redundant: Homeland or Death, the only space where life is possible.
Addendum: A Black, Black, without white masks -as Frantz Fanon says-, complained to me precisely because of the name of one of my columns that I titled: ‘The Black Hand’. I apologize to all my black brothers. Of course it is not the color of the skin, but the evil of the heart, because there are white exploiters as bad as black exploiters. I should have titled the column: ‘The Perverse Hand’.
Comandante Antonio García
Souce: ELN
With All Eyes on the Middle East, the Trump Administration Advances Its “Donroe Doctrine” in Latin America
Trump is aggressively fulfilling his promise to advance U.S. imperialism in Latin America, collaborating with the region’s far-right leaders. Class struggle, and mobilization across the Americas against U.S. imperialism, can beat back this advance.
#news #usa #USPolitics #international #latinamerica #southamerica #war #imperialism #democracy #trump
Trump is aggressively fulfilling his promise to advance U.S. imperialism in Latin America, collaborating with the region’s far-right leaders. Class struggle, and mobilization across the Americas against U.S. imperialism, can beat back this advance.
COFFEE IS LOVE & PEACE!
☕🖤✌🏻
https://youtu.be/e1-pb_n-i5c?si=NiPZ8rDL5QJsmu9v
#JamesMcCartney #TheBeatles #PaulMcCartney #activism #activist #STOPTHEWAR #NOTWAR #music #Sudan #Israel #Gaza #Palestine
#Russia #Ukraine #Iran #Asia #Africa #Europe #NorthAmerica #SouthAmerica #Australia
TODOS JUNTOS! COMO UNO!
ESPERANZA, AMOR Y PAZ!
🌐🌕💖✌🏻
#Artemis2 #ArtemisII #Nasa #space #espacio #activismo #activista #news #noticias #mundo #worldwide #STOPTHEWAR #NOGUERRA
#WARISOVER #Sudan #Israel #Palestine
#Russia #Ukraine #Iran #Asia #Africa #Europe #NorthAmerica #SouthAmerica #Australia
ALL TOGETHER!
HOPE, LOVE & PEACE!
🪷🕊️💖✌🏻
https://youtu.be/W68-XaFepOg?si=jm9UyXZhStnj8n8_
#WARISOVER #STOPTHEWAR
#FLOWERPOWER
#Sudan #Israel #Gaza #Palestine
#Russia #Ukraine #Iran #Irak #NorthKorea #worldwide
#global #news #Asia #Africa #Europe #NorthAmerica #SouthAmerica #Australia #activism
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