Pink Flamingos offer a natural spectacle, in a landscape where they are free and in their habitat; The wonderful thing is that you can see flamingos in Yucatán, Mexico; We will tell you where to see them, when the best season is and why they are pink.
What are flamingos?
These are birds with very long beaks, necks and legs, and plumage between pink and salmon tones; although the color on the chest, belly, and head is a little more intense.
Its habitat is the northern coast of the Peninsula and Yucatán is the only place in Mexico that offers such an experience to the eye, in areas where there is a rich ecosystem.
Where are flamingos born?
The pink flamingo is native to America, southern Europe, Africa, and Asia. In America, it lives in the Yucatan Peninsula, the Bahamas, the Greater Antilles, the Caribbean coast in Colombia and Venezuela, and the Galapagos Islands.
Where do flamingos live and what do they feed on?
Flamingos feed mainly on mollusks, insects, and small crustaceans that they capture in the marshes (low, marshy terrain that floods sea waters) and brackish waters of their habitat.
Some flamingos also eat blue-green algae, red algae, larvae, and other species within their reach, which exist in the Yucatan Peninsula.
What do flamingos eat to be pink?
Flamingos owe their pink color to the accumulation of pigments in their skin and feathers because their diet is mainly made up of brine shrimp, a small crustacean that lives in brackish waters. The pink color of the Las Coloradas ponds is also due to the brine shrimp.
Brackish waters are intermediate in salinity and border the sea, they are located between ocean water and continental fresh waters.
When flamingo babies are born, they hatch with white plumage, but they change color due to what they eat.
Thus, a flamingo that eats well and is healthy is a color that ranges from deep pink to salmon and a pale flamingo means that it is sick or suffers from lack of food.
What is the difference between flamenco and Flamingo?
According to the dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE), the word flamingo is the English word that designates the bird that in Spanish is called flamenco.
The best places to see flamingos in Yucatán, Mexico, in their natural habitat are the Ría Celestún, in Celestún and the Ría Lagartos Biosphere Reserve, in the town of Río Lagartos.
But in both places, it is in different seasons and you will decide which of the two you prefer or if you prefer to live both experiences if you enjoy bird watching.
Both places are protected natural areas on the Yucatan coast, with various seabirds, and of course large groups of flamingos.
When is the best season to see them?
The best season to see flamingos in Yucatan in Río Lagartos is approximately March to September, and in Celestún it is from December to March.
In the case of Rio Lagartos, it is from March when the groups of pink birds arrive there and begin their reproduction, so they remain in that area until September, offering a true natural spectacle.
The ideal season to see flamingos in Celestún, Yucatán is, as already said, in the winter season from December to March; There they also offer a wonderful view with the contrast of colors between the vegetation, fauna, and waters.
It is a wetland there, but there are also coastal dunes, mangroves, lagoons, turquoise beaches, and lowland jungles in the region.
If you have doubts about what an estuary is, it is shallow sea water, where fresh and salt water come together and become brackish, that is, with low salinity that allows another ecosystem that allows flamingos to eat like the brine shrimp.
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