Status
Least Concern
Habitat
Saline lagoons, alkaline lakes, mudflats
Range
Africa · India · Europe
Group
Birds
A bird whose colour is entirely a matter of diet.
The pink is carotenoid, drawn from algae and brine shrimp and deposited in the feathers. A flamingo fed a different diet fades to white — the colour is a live readout of the health of the lake.
The bill is held upside down and works as a pump, drawing water through lamellae fine enough to strain out single-celled algae. It is one of the few bird bills that is genuinely a piece of industrial filtration equipment.
Frames in the archive
Full gallery
Filtration
Little Rann of Kutch.
