Flamingos in Florida


	Many people have seen Flamingos on Miami Vice and think they will see this bird around their local pond. Due to the development of northern and central areas of Florida, the Flamingo has been driven south. The few places you can see Flamingos are in some of the state parks, zoos and possibly the Miami area. The pictures shown here were taken at Homossasa Springs State Park. The Picture to the right is a Spoonbill, sometimes mistaken for a Flamingo because of it's pink color.

"I work at a major zoo here in the state of Florida and I have always been fascinated with these birds. I would like to point out, however, that flamingos are not native to North America. The flamingo has not been known to ever breed here, or to live here for extended periods of time, which are just some of the requirements for a bird species to be considered a "native species" animal within a particular region. Flamingos make their homes in Europe, Africa, South America, Central America and the Caribbean. The Caribbean, or American, flamingo may visit our area for a short time while searching for food, but it has not been noted to permanently live in our region of the world. Sometimes small numbers of flamingos (they usually have flocks
numbering in the hundreds of thousands) are driven into areas where they normally do not make their homes. This is generally due to a change in food sources or due to the effects of drought. The flamingos that we see here in Florida are generally ones which have been brought in for display purposes in zoos, etc. Their wings are generally pinned or trimmed to keep them within their areas. There have been a few "escapees" due to accidental release, or due to release because of natural disasters such as hurricanes. Generally these birds will stay only for a short while, but they migrate on to more suitable habitat areas and never seem to make us their permanent home"
Dorothy Baldwin zoo educator Jacksonville Zoological Gardens education@jaxzoo.org or flamingo424@hotmail.com I also have a web page about flamingos. It is located at: http://www.geocities.com/Petsburgh/1975