Birds and Birding's Guide to:

Watching THE STORK-LIKE BIRDS

THE FLAMINGOS (Suborder Phcenicopteri)

Flamingo Flocks

As might be supposed, a flock of Flamingos, numbering as it often does hundreds or even thousands and tens of thousands of individuals, presents a truly imposing spectacle, the long files vividly suggesting a company of scarlet-coated soldiers. When migrating or when forced by alarm to take flight, they still hold to the long lines or V-shaped parties.”If the color on the water was novel,”says

Scott,”that of a flock while in the air was truly surprising, a cloud of flame-colored pink, like the hues of a brilliant sunset.”Hume, who saw them on the lakes of Sind, says that”to see one of these enormous flocks rise suddenly when alarmed is a wonderful spectacle; as you approach them, so long as they remain on the water at rest, they look simply like a mass of faintly rosy snow. A rifle is fired, and then the exposure of the upper and under coverts of the wing turns the mass into a gigantic, brilliantly rosy scarf, waving to and fro in mighty folds as it floats away."

previous bird species next bird species