So, to find some answers, Whitfield and colleagues scoured historical records, museum collections, and community science tallies for all mentions of American Flamingos Their conclusion, reported this week in The Condor: Ornithological Applications, is that the species probably originated and nested in Florida until the turn of the last century, and is finally on the upswing again. Although the species is still granted protection under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act, being deemed native means it would benefit from other special management attention.īut as Steven Whitfield, a conservation and research specialist from Zoo Miami, points out, there was no data to back up the non-native versus native argument. On the one hand, the state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission regards flamingos as non-native (a spokesman told the Miami Herald that the designation is being changed for some areas). The question isn’t merely academic it determines the bird's conservation. That, in turn, has cranked up the heat on a long-simmering debate among ornithologists: Some say Florida’s flamingos all escaped from captivity, while others contend that they’re natives that were nearly wiped out by hunters in the 1800s. Over the past few decades, though, the gangly pink waders have been spotted more frequently-and in bigger groups. Tune in to a Miami Vice rerun in your Flamingo Motel room and, boom, flamingos, right there in the opening credits.Ĭultural cachet aside, finding a bona fide flamingo in the Sunshine State was a rare treat for most of the 20th century after hunters and poachers decimated the population.
Buy a lotto ticket and you’ve got one on the logo. American Flamingos aren’t hard to find in Florida.
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