The lake itself is highly alkaline, and as such contains a huge amount of algae - enough to support thousands of animals. Everywhere you look the lake shallows are covered with birds.
The flamingoes at the lake are slightly less colourful than others I have seen in zoos over the years but no less impressive. (A flamingo's colouring depends on it's diet and zoo-bound flamingoes are often given the additive canthaxanthin, which is also often given to farmed salmon.)
In the photos below we have two different species - greater and lesser - of flamingo. The lesser flamingo is slightly smaller than the greater flamingo, although the most obvious trait used to differentiate them is the beak - lesser flamingoes have almost completely black beaks, while the beak of the greater flamingo has only a black tip.
The lake also supports huge numbers of pelicans - they don't seem to like socialising with the flamingoes and stay huddled together in large groups, both in the shallows and on the lake shore.
The photos below are of great white pelicans. They seem a little clumsy while waddling around on land, but look amazing while in flight. Fortunately, a few performed for us and I managed to get some of my favourite shots of the day of these huge birds in the air.
No comments:
Post a Comment