I look out from my nest of branches in the Amazonian rain forest and understand for the umpteenth time why it is called the rain forest; it rains a lot. I am the Red-and-Green Macaw that everyone wants to see during their time in the Amazon. I am waiting for the rain to clear up-if it will-so that I can go out over the water and a hide to eat some clay.

The reason that we as macaws need to eat clay is that 80% of our diet is made up of unripe fruit nuts, and the trees have developed a grudge against us and have put poisons in the fruit so that we should die from eating, but we don’t because we eat clay always before we eat the unripe fruit.

Finally, after all of my cogitations, it is starting to clear up. The rain clouds are moving away and I feel like eating clay. When I get to the clay lick, I am one of the first ones there, so I sit on top of a bamboo stick and wait for something to happen. Eventually, it does, and all of us fly back and forth to see if anything is hiding. When we think it is safe, I am the first one down at the lick, eating. As soon as my two friends start to join me, a vulture flies over and we all fly away. Oh, well, at least I got some clay.

That’s all for now, Folks!