The Red Lower Mandible (Beak) Psittacula krameri

Most feral Indian Ring-necked Parakeets, male and female, seen in southern UK in recent years have a red top mandible (upper beak) with a black tip and a black lower mandible. These are as the southern Indian Ringneck subspecies Psittacula krameri manillensis.

These feral Ringnecks in Tenerife are smallish and may be hybrids with the African variety (nominate P. k. krameri, from North and West to East Africa). However, the African subspecies has a maroon upper and lower bill (see link below) and the Indian has a black lower bill; these above seem to have all-red beaks but the red is much pinker in the male and more greyish red in the female.

Lipstick here, with her bright red upper and lower mandibles, has been a visitor to my garden. Her beak is very bright red with a slight yellowing at the tip and top of lower beak. I have since seen a few other Ringnecks with red lower beaks. It seems that chicks have all red beaks - but not so bright - so she's likely just a juvenile. (I've read that the northern Indian Ringneck, P. k. borealis, has an all-red beak, upper and lower, but that it has no yellow in the plumage. She and her friends have yellow.)

Mixed group, most with black lower beak but two with red lower beaks (one of the all-red-beaked birds prising the lid off the feeder showing yellow feathers in the shorter juvenile tail).