The Greater Flamingo Gazette

Greater Flamingo news from around the Mediterranean

Dear Greater Flamingo sponsors,

This year again, the Greater Flamingo colony began occupying the Fangassier Lagoon in the Camargue in early spring. It has been the largest breeding site for the species in France for over 40 ans, and is one of the main sites in the Mediterranean Basin.

Unfortunately, an air plane flew over this area at low altitude in May, which made the colony leave the site after the beginning of its successful nesting. It went to occupy another part of the saltworks in Aigues-Mortes, about thirty kilometres to the west, where the flamingos had already taken refuge several times in recent years. 350 to 400 chicks will leave their nests between now and the end of August.

This disturbance will nevertheless have allowed the Tour du Valat to engage in discussion with officials about the trajectories and the altitude of air corridors in the Camargue, so that such undesirable incidents can be avoided in the future.

In no way does the breeding failure at the Fangassier Lagoon call into question the good health of this species, which has been made possible by several decades of work by the Tour du Valat and its partners throughout the Mediterranean Basin, the central part of its distribution area.

Such work this year includes several successful flamingo ringing operations in Spain, in Turkey, and in Tunisia.

On August 4 in the Ebre Delta in Catalonia, 400 of more than 2,000 chicks were ringed successfully.

Ringing of flamingos in the Ebre Delta (Spain) on August 4^th, 2019

© Eloi Domingo Catalan

In the Gediz Delta in Turkey, 176 of nearly 15,000 nestlings were also ringed on August 4, in a colony of over 17,000 pairs of adults!

Ringing on August 4^th, 2019 in the Gediz delta (Turkey)

Last but not least, 2019 will go down in history in Tunisia because an exceptional colony with over 22,000 flamingos nested in the Sahline saltworks close to Monastir. This figure smashes the previous record for Tunisia, which dates back to 1974 when some 8,200 chicks were sighted.

The Greater Flamingo colony next to Monastir (Tunisia) in August 2019

© Hichem Azafzaf - AAO/Birdlife en Tunisie

The Tour du Valat funds ring reading operations there, which are conducted by its Tunisian partner Les Amis des Oiseaux (AAO/BirdLife partner in Tunisia), in order to better comprehend the origin of the flamingos that nested this year on this site where Algerian, French, Italian, and Spanish birds have already been sighted.

In addition, given how close this colony is to the Monastir airport, AAO and other Tunisian stakeholders are currently studying the possibility of conducting the ringing operations at the beginning of the month of September and will make a final decision about this at a later date.

Thanks for your support! It will contribute to the longevity of the Tour du Valat’s Greater Flamingo programme and to our partners’ projects!

Learn more about the Tour du Valat’s Greater Flamingo programme

Did you know?

• 1977: first ringing of Greater Flamingo chicks by the Tour du Valat

• 804,000 rings read on 69,700 flamingos all around the Mediterranean since the beginning of the programme, 27,300 of which were ringed in the Camargue!

• 29 days: the length of time the 140 g egg is incubated by Greater Flamingo parents in the spring

• More than 70 years: the possible lifespan of a Greater Flamingo

• 11 weeks: the average age at which flamingo chicks begin to fly

• 30%: the proportion of the Greater Flamingos born in the Camargue that stay in France every year. The others migrate in the autumn to southern Spain, Sardinia, or Africa.

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