Greater Flamingos

Ma la minaccia più grave per il fenicottero è la distruzione del suo habitat: è per questo che nel corso degli ultimi anni è stata sviluppata una strategia internazionale per la sua conservazione.

Men have always thought of flamingos as something magic and the silhouette of these birds appears in objects of art thousands of years old.

Flamingos are no doubt more famous for their beautiful plumage than for their cry. Their vocalisations range from a low muttering, during feeding, to a kind of grunt, which acts as a menace. In flight, they often give out a gooselike cry, low and nasal.

The diet of flamingos is mainly made up of aquatic invertebrates: crustaceans (such as Artemia salina), molluscs, anellids, grubs and chrysalises. Seeds and leaves of water-plants (Ruppia, Scirpus, Juncus, etc.) are sometimes swallowed together with algas, diatoms and even bacteria.

The colour of the feathers of flamingos is due to the presence of particular organic substances: the carotenoids. These substances are not produced by the flamingos themselves, but they are present in the algas and in the small crustaceans (Artemia salina and others) on which the flamingos feed.

The greater flamingos chiefly occur in lagoons and salt or brackish ponds on the coast, wide deltaic areas and slimy expanses.

Flamingos only nidificate in rather big colonies: it was found out that the males begin the courting only in presence of numerous specimens of their own species.

The origins

The flamingos belong to one of the oldest Order of birds in the world, i.e. Ciconiiformes, which dates back to more than 50 million of years ago.

In the Mediterranean basin the majority of population is concentrated in the west, although groups of hundreds or thousands of specimens have been pointed out in Turkey, Greece and Egypt as well.