Photos by Dominiek Plouvier at the Matapica beach in Suriname
in July 2008 and J.H. Ribot, in the zoo of Emmen 1997 (as the
photo just below the text).
The flamingo is a long (135 cm) bird, that breeds in the
Carribean, for instance on the island of Bonaire. But it breeds
also in the north of Brazil (Amapá). In south and middle America
it is somewhat more red than birds of the same species from
Europe, Asia and Africa. It does not breed in Suriname (although
a colony was still around in 1930), but it visits the coast in
large groups. There it searches for food in soft mud. In the
seventies more birds have been reported from the east then from
the west coast, the last years it is just the other way around.
When they fly, flamingos are easily recognisable by their long
legs.
Flamingos eat by walking slowly with their heads down, filtering
small animals from the water and algae. In zoos they must be fed
the right kind of food to keep their color, just like the scarlet
ibisses (food with a lot of carotene, I suppose). Confusingly, in
Suriname the local name of scarlet ibisses is 'flamingo'.
Observations of flamingos along the lenght of the coast. Between 1970 and 1975 Arie Spaans recorded some days with hundreds of and the last years those same numbers are reported in counts from an airplane, organised by Stinasu. Joop Schultz made the photo below of a group of Flamingos passing the Kwerimanbank in Suriname. Most birds are seen between January and June, but they are present in all months, coming from breeding places in Brazil and the Carribean (Bonaire for instance).
| Distribution in Suriname (explanation) | |
| Coastal area |  |
| Savanna |  |
| Forests | |
| Mountain forests | |
| Sipalawini savanna | |
Names in:
More photos of waterbirds in Suriname
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