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The food they filter out varies by where they live, but it’s typically made up of tiny organisms like plankton. Flamingoes are unusual in that they are the only true avian filter feeders.
The filtering of food items is assisted by hairy structures called lamellae, which line the mandibles, and the large, rough-surfaced tongue. The pink or reddish color of flamingos comes from carotenoids in their diet of animal and plant plankton. American flamingos are a brighter red color because of the beta carotene availability in their food ...
For example, the bright yellow of an American goldfinch, the startling orange of a juvenile red-spotted newt, the deep red of a cardinal and the pink of a flamingo are all produced by carotenoid pigments synthesized by plants. In the case of the flamingo, the bird eats pink shrimps, which are themselves unable to synthesize carotenoids.
The greater flamingo (Phoenicopterus roseus) is the most widespread and largest species of the flamingo family. Common in the Old World, they are found in Northern (coastal) and Sub-Saharan Africa, the Indian Subcontinent (south of the Himalayas), the Middle East, the Levant, the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Aden, the Red Sea, and the Mediterranean countries of Southern Europe.
Thanks to researchers from Emory University and Georgia Tech, we now know how Flamingos stand steady on just one leg.
The flamingos forage in shallow salty waters for resources. They exhibit the most flexible foraging pattern compared to that of the Chilean and James's flamingos. [12] When grouping the Andean flamingos with Chilean flamingos or James's flamingos, Andean flamingos adopt the foraging patterns of the species with which it is grouped. [12]
Illustration by J. G. Keulemans (1886) The James's flamingo is smaller than the Andean flamingo, and is about the same size as the Old World species, the lesser flamingo.A specimen of the bird was first collected by Charles Rahmer, who was on a collecting expedition sponsored by Harry Berkeley James, (1846–1892, a manager of a Chilean saltpetre mine born in Walsall, England) after whom the ...
Crop milk is also secreted from the crop of flamingos and the male emperor penguin, [1] [2] [3] suggesting independent evolution of this trait. [4] Unlike in mammals where typically only females produce milk, crop milk is produced by both males and females in pigeons and flamingos; and in penguins, only by the male. [ 5 ]