Flamingo breeding activity, a few insights (2)
Just another quick one on the spectacle that are love-struck flamingos at Slimbridge at present. A few nice bits of behaviour that have been occurring over the past week or so. It's not just the greater flamingos that have been getting into the spring of things (bad pun, sorry) but the other flocks too have been in the mood for dancing...
This photo is a particular favourite of mine. Towards the end of last week we had a real pea-souper of a fog in town. It was grey and dank and thick and horrible. The Caribbean flamingos, however, were not to be put off and there was much head-flagging and marching around their pen. "We may not be able to see the ends of our beaks but we need to make babies NOW!" Or something like that...
Nothing stops the birds and the bees. Not enough a great big dollop of fog.
Hot on their heels are the Andean flamingos who, lead by Mr James, went in for a bit of sedate marching. Well, to be fair, very sedate and they never really broke into a sweat. But it's the trying that counts right?
[yframe url='http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tth8IWnISsA']
*note, they DO get more enthused towards the end of the clip (sorry it's a bit long!).
Follow the leader is fun to play but next time, folks, put a bit more welly into it hey?
And finally, the real stars of this week are the lesser flamingos who put on a beautiful show of their synchronised moves. There's a reason why wildlife filmmakers always use these guys to demonstrate flamingo dancing. They just seem to give it a bit more coordination and oompf than the other species... enjoy!
[yframe url='www.youtube.com/watch?v=_X6EVrJG7qE&list=TLaVzZRYVltTv86s_9Aj_HQH3XbZ-LRKNM']
