Flamingos have slender legs, long, graceful necks, large wings, and short tails. [26], Flamingos filter-feed on brine shrimp and blue-green algae as well as insect larvae, small insects, mollusks and crustaceans making them omnivores. Zoos like the San Diego Zoo and Animal Park use special flamingo pellets enriched with pigment.
Flamingos are highly gregarious birds. [31] These displays stimulate "synchronous nesting" (see below) and help pair up those birds that do not already have mates. Flamingo feather coloration ranges from pale pink to crimson according to species. On some of East Africa’s large lakes, more than a million lesser flamingos (Phoeniconaias minor) gather during the breeding season. In zoos, flamingos need a diet rich in carotenoids to maintain their distinctive plumage. [30] The members of a group stand together and display to each other by stretching their necks upwards, then uttering calls while head-flagging, and then flapping their wings.
To feed, flamingos tramp the shallows, head down and bill underwater, stirring up organic matter with their webbed feet. The amount of pigment laid down in the feathers depends on the quantity of pigment in the flamingoâs diet. They are sometimes classified in the order Ciconiiformes (herons and storks) but also show similarities to anseriforms (ducks and geese), charadriiforms (shorebirds), and pelecaniforms (pelicans and cormorants).
By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. The Chilean flamingo (Phoenicopterus chilensis) is primarily an inland species. [20] However, the behaviour also takes place in warm water and is also observed in birds that do not typically stand in water.
The filtering of food items is assisted by hairy structures called lamellae, which line the mandibles, and the large, rough-surfaced tongue. The greater flamingo (Phoenicopterus ruber) breeds in large colonies on the coasts of the Atlantic Ocean and Gulf of Mexico in tropical and subtropical America. In both cases, this pigment is responsible for mimicking the color found naturally in wild species. The Lesser Flamingo is the smallest Flamingo and has a dark red beak and dark yellow-orange eyes surrounded by a reddish-brown ring and dark bare skin between the eye and beak. )[36], For the first six days after the chicks hatch, the adults and chicks stay in the nesting sites. After being digested, the carotenoid pigments dissolve in fats and are deposited in the growing feathers, becoming orange or pink. (2000). As a result of a 2014 publication,[16] the family was reclassified into two genera. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). [37], The first flamingo hatched in a European zoo was a Chilean flamingo at Zoo Basel in Switzerland in 1958.
[21] As well as standing in the water, flamingos may stamp their webbed feet in the mud to stir up food from the bottom. Alternatively, they could be placed in one order, with Phoenocopteriformes taking priority. [22], Flamingos are capable flyers, and flamingos in captivity often require wing clipping to prevent escape. Andeanthat has a pale pink coloring and has black primary flight colors and a pale yellow beak that has a black tip 3. The hormone prolactin stimulates production. [24], The greater flamingo is the tallest of the six different species of flamingos, standing at 3.9 to 4.7 feet (1.2 to 1.4 m) with a weight up to 7.7 pounds (3.5 kg), and the shortest flamingo species (the lesser) has a height of 2.6 feet (0.8 m) and weighs 5.5 pounds (2.5 kg). Flocks numbering in the hundreds may be seen in long, curving flight formations and in wading groups along the shore. Flamingos whose sole diet is blue-green algae are darker than those that get it second-hand by eating animals that have digested blue-green algae). When they are two weeks old, the chicks congregate in groups, called "microcrèches", and their parents leave them alone.
Flamingos are flamboyantly colored birds, displaying startling shades of pink, red, or orange. Bradford, Alina.
Andean miners have killed flamingos for their fat, believing that it would cure, This page was last edited on 20 October 2020, at 00:59. There are two subspecies of the greater flamingo: the Caribbean flamingo (P. ruber ruber) and the Old World flamingo (P. ruber roseus) of Africa and southern Europe and Asia.
In ancient Rome, flamingo tongues were eaten as a rare delicacy.
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[38], Greater, an at least 83-year-old greater flamingo, believed to be the oldest in the world, died at the Adelaide Zoo in Australia in January 2014. A pair of African flamingos which had not yet had their wings clipped escaped from the Wichita, Kansas zoo in 2005.
The reason for this behaviour is not fully understood. Announcing our NEW encyclopedia for Kids! webexhibits.org/causesofcolor
High Andes in Peru, Chile, Bolivia and Argentina.
Studer-Thiersch, A. Accessed March 2018. Flamingos (Family Phoenicopteridae) in Africa. They locate a suitable spot on the mudflat to build a nest (the female usually selects the place).
Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. Flamingos or flamingoes[2] /fləˈmɪŋɡoʊz/ are a type of wading bird in the family Phoenicopteridae, the only bird family in the order Phoenicopteriformes. Subadults are whitish, acquiring the pink plumage with age. —. Flamingos or flamingoes /fləˈmɪŋɡoʊz/ are a type of wading bird in the family Phoenicopteridae, the only bird family in the order Phoenicopteriformes. [31] The displays do not seem directed towards an individual, but occur randomly. Their unusually shaped bill, held upside down, contains lamellae, plates that act like tiny filters to trap shrimp and other water creatures. Flamingos are generally non-migratory birds, but a colony may relocate under the pressures of climate or water level changes. Salmon and trout owe their pink color to carotenoids deposited in their body fat.
Flocks Unlike the American flamingo, blue flamingos have bright blue feathers, yellow eyes and short bodies.The bird has been named "South American Blue Flamingo". 121–130 in N. Duplaix-Hall and J. Kear, editors.
Flamingos can have a wingspan as small as 37 inches (94 cm) to as big as 59 inches (150 cm).
This was definitive proof for leg position as a method of thermoregulation. It is also the smallest and the deepest in colour.
Two smaller species that live high in the Andes Mountains of South America are the Andean flamingo (Phoenicoparrus andinus) and the puna, or James’s, flamingo (Phoenicoparrus jamesi).
With their bright feathers and strongly hooked bills, flamingos are among the most easily recognized water birds. Flamingos are one of the oldest species of birds, with fossil remains dating back 30 to 50 million years. [7] A 2002 paper concluded they are waterfowl,[8] but a 2014 comprehensive study of bird orders found that flamingos and grebes are not waterfowl, but rather are part of Columbea along with doves, sandgrouse, and mesites. Get exclusive access to content from our 1768 First Edition with your subscription. [39], Zoos have used mirrors to improve flamingo breeding behaviour.
This article was most recently revised and updated by, https://www.britannica.com/animal/flamingo-bird, San Diego Zoo Animals and Plants - Flamingo, flamingo - Children's Encyclopedia (Ages 8-11), flamingo - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up). To preserve their rosy color at the zoo, flamingos are fed a commercially prepared diet high in carotenoids. The pink or reddish color of flamingos comes from carotenoids in their diet of animal and plant plankton.
Flamingo feathers obtain their wonderful rosy pink color from pigments in the organisms they eat. [6] The peculiar presbyornithids were used to argue for a close relationship between flamingos, waterfowl, and waders. In fish farms and bird parks, carotenoids are added to the feed to create a pleasing pink color, but this has no effect on palatability or health. Flamingos are often seen standing on one leg. 2014. [13] The fossil palaelodids can be considered evolutionarily, and ecologically, intermediate between flamingos and grebes. The source of this varies from species to species but is usually shrimp or blue-green algae.
1. Earlier genetic studies, such as those of Charles Sibley and colleagues, also supported this relationship. [4] Relationships to the waterfowl were considered as well,[5] especially as flamingos are parasitized by feather lice of the genus Anaticola, which are otherwise exclusively found on ducks and geese.
They use their tongues to suck water in at the front of the bill and pump it out through the sides. Carotenoids also occur in mollusks and crustaceans, so flamingos may be fed shrimp and clams.
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