There are a couple of different kinds of black cockatoos. Here's some good information to know about a black cockatoo.

What is a black cockatoo?

A black cockatoo is a member of the cockatoo family that has black markings. Black cockatoos include the yellow-tailed black cockatoo, the red-tailed black cockatoo and the glossy black cockatoos.

The yellow-tailed black cockatoo

Unfortunately, unless you find a zoo that has a captive yellow-tailed black cockatoo, you're not going to find a yellow-tailed black cockatoo in the United States. These birds live in the woodlands of Australia.

From a distance, the yellow-tailed black cockatoo looks all black, but it actually has yellow markings that line the outside of the bird's feathers. The yellow patches on this bird are on the bird's cheeks and on its tail.

Surprisingly, the female yellow-tailed black cockatoo is more colorful and therefore more attractive than the male yellow-tailed black cockatoo. In many birds, the male is the more attractive and brightly colored bird. A bird's color is used to help it meld into its surroundings and it's also used as a showpiece for attracting birds of the opposite sex.

The red-tailed black cockatoos

The red-tailed black cockatoo also lives in Australia, but the species is seeing declining numbers because their habitat is being destroyed. In fact, it's believed that less than 1,000 of these birds are in existence. Most of these birds live in an area that is protected by the Australian government, but their environment is still disappearing due to farming and tree harvesting.

Glossy black cockatoos

Oddly enough, glossy black cockatoos are actually brown, though they appear to be black, especially when they're viewed from a distance. Glossy black cockatoos are small, like the red-tailed black cockatoo, but the can have the coloring of either the red-tailed black cockatoo or the yellow-tailed black cockatoo. They usually have yellow or red coloring on their tails.

Like the other two black cockatoos, the glossy black cockatoo lives in Australia although they occupy an area that is less populated. As a result they're not being pushed out of their environment at the same rate as the red-tailed black cockatoos. However, this doesn't mean that the birds are completely safe from development. It's believed that they used to have a larger, denser population in Australia but that they were forced to move to more discrete areas of the country once humans started to develop their habitat.

The black cockatoo likes to eat seed and fruit produced by the trees in its habitat.