Macaws are not only strong fliers, but likewise excellent climbers, and in the latter mode of progression make use of their powerful beaks as well as their feet, in captivity, at any rate, frequently hanging from a branch or perch by the beak alone, which is specially adapted for obtaining a hold on smooth branches by the sharp downward curvature of the extremity of its upper half. The food of these birds includes fruits and seeds, especially hard nuts of various kinds, which are cracked in the strong beak as if in a vice. When the fruits or nuts are large, they are held to the beak in one foot. The thick, fleshy tongue aids in extracting the inside of fruits from the rind, or the kernels of nuts from their shells. [Illustration] All macaws are essentially birds of the great primeval forests of tropical America, the blue and yellow species being especially abundant in those of northern Brazil. During the hottest hours of the day these birds sit quietly perched on the lower branches of thick-foliaged trees, the long tail hanging straight down, and the neck being drawn in. After resting for several hours, they issue forth in search of food; and a flock of these magnificent birds on the wing in the clear air of the tropics is a truly splendid sight, as they fly slowly to and from their feeding-places. Having selected a likely looking tree, the whole flock descend with a rush, and proceed to strip it of its fruit. Quickly each bird climbs out to the end of a branch and sets to work at cracking nuts, or devouring softer fruit. When such a flock of araraunas is feasting, little is seen of the birds themselves, but their presence is amply manifested by their incessant and discordant cries and screams. If a shot be fired in the neighbourhood, the whole flock rises immediately in a gold and azure cloud. Macaws of all kinds constantly make raids on cultivated crops, where, unless promptly driven off, they do incalculable damage in a surprisingly short space of time, cocoa being one of the crops to which they are specially partial. As is the case with all members of the parrot tribe, the union between the sexes of the ararauna is very close: the two members of a pair are thorough comrades, and live only for themselves and their offspring. At the pairing-season each couple of the older birds resorts to the same spot, and often to the same tree, as has served them previously as a breeding-place. For the nest a tall tree is always selected, and a slit in the trunk or a hollow in one of the branches is enlarged by means of the powerful beak until a cavity large enough to contain the nest is excavated. In this chamber the female ararauna deposits a couple of white eggs of nearly the same size as those of a domesticated hen, afterwards incubating them with great assiduity, her long tail projecting all the time out of the hole, and thus revealing the situation of the nest.