Greater Flamingo

It feeds head-down, pumping water through comb-like plates in its bent bill to strain out tiny prey; the pink of an adult is borrowed from carotenoids in that food, so the grey birds here are juveniles yet to take on colour. A vagrant to the Bengaluru region — recorded at Hoskote Lake only a handful of times, the notable earlier visit a flock of about six in September 2019.

Family

Phoenicopteridae (flamingos)

Length

110–150 cm

Wingspan

140–187 cm

Diet

Algae, diatoms, brine shrimp and other small crustaceans, molluscs, and insect larvae, filtered from water and mud

Range

Africa, southern Europe, and southern and south-western Asia; wanders widely and turns up inland as a vagrant