Hi Aquatic Sentinels!🐬

Once again, I bring you content that I consider to be of quality, this takes several hours of reading, comprehension and writing.💡📚

But more than that, this is one more publication so that together we can appreciate and contemplate how wonderful our ocean is!

🦈🦀🐢🐳🐙 I hope you enjoy it!🐟🦈🦀🐢🐳

Photo by Luis Mauricio Mena Páramo📸
📍Guanajuato, México

Some may be wondering: Why do we talk about a bird in a community about aquatic fauna? The answer is simple...

There are birds that are considered marine😄, such is the case of seagulls, pelicans or flamingos. The latter are always admired for their beauty and their way of walking.

And of course... its beautiful pink color is always well regarded by nature lovers. The pink flamingo is one of the icons of southeastern Mexico, and it is always seen in blue waters interacting with many others of the same species... let's talk a little about it!👇

Photo by Jorge A. Pérez Torres📸
📍Yucatán, México

👉Join us until the end of this post to find out all the details👈...

_{The following information is taken from: Comisión Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas, CONANP (2021). "Dio inicio el ciclo reproductivo del flamenco rosado en la Reserva de la Biósfera Ría Lagartos; Escalante-Piego. P. 2010. "Ficha técnica de Phoenicopterus ruber. Fichas sobre las especies de aves incluidas en Proyecto de Norma Oficial Mexicana PROY-NOM-059-ECOL-2000. Parte 1". Instituto de Biología, UNAM. Bases de datos SNIB-CONABIO. Proyecto No. W007. México, D.F. Adapted by @juanbg}

The characteristics that make them unique

Sometimes we tend to confuse some species of birds, especially if they are very similar in color, but in reality the flamingo is one of those unmistakable birds due to its long legs and necks. They are considered large birds because they can measure between 89 to 122cm and we can differentiate the females because they are 20% smaller than the males, and their legs are shorter. Their head is quite small compared to the rest of their body, their jaw has a shovel-shaped design and their beak is used for feeding by means of filtration.

Photo by Diana Robinson📸
📍Key West, Florida

This pink coloration is not random, they obtain that color thanks to pigments in their body called carotenoids, and they use it precisely to stimulate reproduction😲. These pigments are obtained thanks to some algae and small invertebrates that they feed on.

30,000 flamingos in Ría Lagartos!👏

The National Commission of Protected Natural Areas (CONANP) in Mexico has reported that since September of last year the breeding season of this bird has started, the monitoring is carried out in a place called Ría Lagartos in Mexico📍 (I have had the opportunity to meet and It is very beautiful, actually, it is relatively close to the city where I live)... a preliminary figure of 15,000 established flamingo nests is estimated, and a population of adult flamingos in the Ría Lagartos Reserve of approximately 30, 000 specimens , CONANP has carried out monitoring since January of last year.

Photo by Katja Schulz📸
📍Yucatán, México

Sounds like a good number of new flamingo births, right? but in reality all is not well...🙃

because variations have been observed with respect to the time of year where the breeding season begins, this may be due to climate change, unfortunately, affecting the species and its reproduction.

Observation work🔎

Even so, an important growth has been observed during what was 2021... in January, CONANP observed 1,000 flamingos in Punta Manolo and while several days passed, an increase of 7,000 flamingos was observed👈, they also observed courtship and copulation, so that the group was quite comfortable with the conditions in which they lived.

Photo by Alex Pacheco📸
📍Yucatán, México

Due to weather conditions and tides, these groups of flamingos observed moved to different important points where previous years had reproduced (places like Yalmakan, Punta Mecoh, Peten Hu, among others, all located in Mexico).

Ría Lagartos and its effort for conservation✔️🌎

The term "ría" is used by the inhabitants of the place and refers to the coastal lagoons that are formed because of the wetlands🌅, here we can find a great diversity of flora and fauna,

Ría Lagartos was the first Mexican wetland registered in 1986 in the Ramsar Convention✔️

Photo by Ramón Trinchan📸
📍Yucatán, México

...an international convention that seeks to preserve the diversity of these beautiful places. In this place you can also see many lizards, which is why it is called this way.

Photo by Karine Scott📸
📍Galapagos Islands, Floreana, Galapagos

👉In this place, efforts have been made to constantly monitor the pink flamingo since 1999, one of its emblematic species. It is important to note that tourism is allowed but only for eco-tourism, without exceeding a certain number of visitors per day, this is one of the reasons why we observe many species to this day.🐢🐊

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