Insights on the vegetal diet of Blue-and-yellow Macaw (Ara ararauna; Linnaeus, 1758) in an urban area from Central-West Brazil, by DNA metabarcoding

Studying animal diets can be of great value to conservation biology; however, identifying diet items by observation can be challenging, constrained by factors like habitat structure, observer distance, and climatic conditions. Our aim was to evaluate the diet of the free-living Blue-and-yellow Macaw in an urban area of Central-West Brazil, using DNA metabarcoding. Cloacal swab samples were collected in nests during the nestlings' monitoring season. After eDNA extractions, the nuclear internal transcribed spacer (ITS) and the chloroplast psbA-trnH intergenic regions were amplified and sequenced using the Oxford Nanopore Technologies MinION. Blastn was performed using a local database to analyze our sequences. The most abundant taxa detected included pink ipê (Handroanthus impetiginosus), amate (Ficus obtusifolia), and mango (Mangifera indica), at central nest; and queen's crape myrtle (Lagerstroemia speciosa), java plum (Syzygium cumini), pequi (Caryocar brasiliense), peterebi (Cordia trichotoma), and mango at peripheral nest. Our findings showed that DNA metabarcoding provides a more comprehensive and detailed assessment of the diet of Blue-and-yellow Macaw, complementing traditional methods and underscoring its value as a powerful and sensitive tool for advancing ecological and conservation studies.