Major Mitchell's Cockatoo

About the Major Mitchell's Cockatoo

The pink cockatoo (Cacatua leadbeateri), also known as Major Mitchell's cockatoo or Leadbeater's cockatoo, is a medium-sized cockatoo that inhabits arid and semiarid inland areas across Australia, with the exception of the north-east.

Irish naturalist Nicholas Aylward Vigors described the species in 1831 as Plyctolophus leadbeateri. The scientific name commemorates the London naturalist and taxidermist Benjamin Leadbeater, who had given Vigors what would become the type specimen. Edward Lear painted it in his 1832 work Illustrations of the Family of Psittacidae, or Parrots. Citing Lear, William Swainson gave it the name Plyctolophus erythropterus.

The pink cockatoo is more closely related to Cacatua than is the galah. Its lineage diverged around the time of or shortly after the acquisition of the long crest, probably the former, as this crest type is not found in all Cacatua cockatoos, so must have been present in an early or incipient stage at the time of the divergence of the pink cockatoo's ancestors. Like the galah, this species has not lost the ability to deposit diluted pigment dyes in its body plumage, although it does not produce melanin colouration... Wikipedia →