GEOGRAPHIC
DISTRIBUTION:
Peru and Uruguay to Tierra del Fuego - South America
CONSERVATION STATUS:
Special Concern
SUMMARY:
Certainly one of the most picturesque and beautiful of the
world's birds.
Flamingos' necks and legs are longer in proportion to their
bodies than those of any other species. They have long sinuous
necks and extremely long slender legs.
Plumage is pale in colour, with darker pink and black wings.
Pink colouring comes from a pigment the bird consumes.
The word flamingo comes from the Latin word for flame. Egyptians
worshipped the flamingo as the living embodiment of the Sun
God Ra. Romans considered flamingo tongue to be a delicacy!
Chileans with some of this year's chicks - Oct 2011
They are sometimes called firebirds because many
species prefer to frequent hot, volcanic mud flats.
There are three different species of flamingo at the Park ~
Chilean, Lesser and Caribbean, numbering well over a hundred
in total.
Our Chilean colony has been breeding successfully since 1982
and surplus stock has been exported around the world to set
up new breeding programmes.
REPRODUCTION:
Flamingos breed during the months of March through to July.
Nests are constructed of mud and the female lays one egg, which
she and the male incubate for one month. During incubation,
flamingos straddle the nest, placing their long legs either
side of it. The egg is elongate and chalky white and the yolk
is blood red. The chicks are born grey with a straight bill,
the upper mandible with a slight hook. The young chicks are
fed by their parents by regurgitation.
They are agile, good at running and
swimming from an early age.
FOOD
HABITS:
Flamingos use their long legs to stir up mud. They then use
their beaks to strain food out of the muddy mixture. In the
wild they eat diatoms, seeds, blue-green algae, a few crustaceans
and molluscs. At the Park they are fed a special high-protein
diet to maintain their pink colouration.
BEHAVIOUR:
Flamingos are social creatures, living and breeding in very
large colonies.
