Flamingos Have Been Popping Up All Over


3 September 2023

Excluding for a couple of uncommon sightings in Florida, flamingos observed within the U.S. don’t seem to be from the wild, they’re escapees from a zoo. Then unexpectedly closing week, after Storm Idalia, flamingos had been shooting up everywhere.

At best, 16 flamingos visited Fred Howard County Park close to Tarpon Springs, FL. Beneath, 6 flamingos stopped by way of St. Mark’s Nationwide Flora and fauna Safe haven, 30 miles south of Tallahassee.

The teams have steadily been a mixture of crimson adults and grey children.

As of Saturday night time the totals have been:

  • 100+ in Florida
  • 11 at Pea Island, North Carolina
  • 2 in South Carolina
  • 2 in Virginia
  • 3 in Alabama
  • 5 in Tennessee
  • and a pair of in OHIO! at Caesar Creek State Park. Those have been observed for just a day after which long past.

American flamingos (Phoenicopterus ruber) are local to the northern shore of South The usa, the Caribbean islands, Cuba, and the Yucatan in Mexico. Storm Idalia plowed via a couple of of the ones places.

Flamingos Have Been Popping Up All Over
Vary map of American flamingo (Phoenicopterus ruber) from Wikipedia

This WKRG video on 27 August presentations Storm Idalia gaining energy because it spans the Caribbean, covering a part of the Yucatan and all of Cuba. The flamingos would have felt it coming and flown north and northeast to get out of its means. Understand the decrease pace winds (sunglasses of inexperienced) at the fringe of the elements map. The golf green wind monitor is the place many of the flamingos had been discovered.

video from WKRG Information on YouTube

Bearing in mind the typhoon monitor, the flamingos are most certainly from Cuba and the Yucatan together with no less than one banded chook.

Given all of the dialogue in regards to the flamingos now showing everywhere Florida (and farther north), this eBird checklist from Amy Grimm is particularly related. This afternoon, Grimm documented 8 flamingos at Marathon, within the Florida Keys, and famous that “One has huge yellow band at the proper leg code DXCL, small silver band on left leg.” Do the bands imply it’s escaped from captivity? No. This mixture — yellow PVC band on one leg with 4-letter code in black letters, atypical band on different leg — has been used for years within the ongoing challenge to band American Flamingos within the large colony at Rio Lagartos, at the north coast of Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula.

Kenn Kaufman at ABA Uncommon Fowl Alert Fb Staff

Flamingo sightings will finish because the birds head house. For now, experience them in movies.

video from Tampa Bay Occasions on YouTube

video embedded from @10TampaBay on YouTube

(credit are within the captions)

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