We’re goin’ to the zoo, zoo, zoo

This month Becky’s Squares are focusing on odd things – you can interpret this any way you want so I am going to take you all to the zoo this month. San Diego Zoo to be precise and the photos featured will be either odd looking animals, animals with odd names, odd facts or slightly odd photos. I hope you’ll enjoy my selection.

Day Seven

With their pink and crimson plumage, long legs and necks, and strongly hooked bills, flamingos cannot be mistaken for any other type of bird. Today, images of flamingos are found in literature (Alice used them as croquet mallets in Through the Looking Glass by Lewis Carroll), and immortalized as plastic lawn ornaments!

American flamingos, a subspecies of greater flamingo, are the brightest, showing their true colours of red, pink, or orange on their legs, bills, and faces. It’s funny to watch them marching: the large, tightly packed flock walks together as one, before switching direction abruptly.

If you want to join in either daily, weekly or just on the odd occasion then please visit Becky, the only rule is that the main photo MUST be a square – that is four equal sides! You have been warned 😉

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Heyjude

I have lived in the UK for most of my life, but when young I definitely had wanderlust and even ended up living in South Africa for several years which was a wonderful experience. I now look forward to a long and leisurely retirement doing what I like most - gardening, photography, walking and travelling.

28 thoughts on “We’re goin’ to the zoo, zoo, zoo”

  3. Is there a link to them marching? The ones here are more strollers, but I do love it when they take off and you get the flash of crimson underbelly.

    1. Only my still image. I never think to use the video feature. I’m sure there must be videos on YouTube. They are very amusing to watch.

        6. Ah, I thought that maybe it was Becky you were referring to when you mentioned you were with bird watchers. I can’t imagine you having the patience to hang around for too long watching the birdies.

        7. The silly b’s don’t stay still enough for me to photograph and when they’re in the trees I can’t even see them. It’s a dead loss. But I do enjoy being with knowledgeable people.

  6. I remember reading that flamingoes get their unusual colours from the food they eat. So I looked it up.
    ‘Flamingos get their pink color from their food.
    Carotenoids give carrots their orange color or turn ripe tomatoes red. They are also found in the microscopic algae that brine shrimp eat. As a flamingo dines on algae and brine shrimp, its body metabolizes the pigments — turning its feathers pink’.
    Best wishes, Pete. x

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