American Flamingo

Phoenicopterus ruber

Least Concern · IUCN Red List

LCLeast ConcernInvertebratesCoastalPlatform nestHuge · 3.0 kg

What the American Flamingo sounds like

Sonogram of the American Flamingo: time runs left to right, pitch bottom to top, and the brighter the mark the louder the sound.
Recorded by Justin Watts · Call · Celestun, Yucatan, Mexico · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via xeno-canto

ID tip

The American flamingo is a large wading bird with reddish-pink plumage. Like all flamingos, it lays a single chalky-white egg on a mud mound, between May and August; incubation until hatching takes from 28 to 32 days; both parents brood their young. They may reach sexual maturity between 3 and 6 years of age, though usually they do not reproduce until they are 6 years old. Their life expectancy of 40 years is one of the longest in birds. Adult American flamingos are smaller on average than greater flamingos, but are the largest flamingos in the Americas.

Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

When to see the American Flamingo

One bar for each month, and every month is filled: this bird is recorded here in all twelve. The wide bar is January, the month with the most records.

Where to see the American Flamingo

Regular rangeRare visitor

The map shades 37 countries with regular records, and 15 more in a lighter tone where the bird turns up only as a stray. Everything unshaded has no records. Countries are listed below the map.

Recorded as a rare visitor in Portugal, Germany, Spain, Israel, Sweden, Belgium, Canada, Italy, Netherlands, Belize, Honduras, Austria, Malawi, Guadeloupe, Martinique.

About the American Flamingo

The American flamingo is a large species of flamingo native to the West Indies, northern South America and the Yucatán Peninsula. It is closely related to the greater flamingo and Chilean flamingo, and was formerly considered conspecific with the greater flamingo, but that treatment is now widely viewed as incorrect due to a lack of evidence. It is also known as the Caribbean flamingo, although it is also present in the Galápagos Islands. It is the only flamingo that naturally inhabits North America.

Text adapted from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Easily confused with

Side by side: American Flamingo vs Greater Flamingo · American Flamingo vs Chilean Flamingo

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