Breeding the Lesser Flamingo in Europe

Abstract

Of the five species of flamingo, only the Greater Phoenicopterus ruber and the Chilean Flamingo P chilensis are bred with any regularity in captivity. The two endangered species, the Andean Pand in us and] ames' Flamingo P jame- si are only kept in a few collections and are in small numbers. Both of these flamingos have been previously bred in captivity. The fifth species, the Lesser Flamingo P. minor is the most numer- ous species in the wild. It is also kept in good numbers in zoos, bird parks and private collections. It is strange, how- ever, that this species has so few breed- ing successes in captivity. In the U.S.A., the Bronx Zoo (New York) has bred it, but the young failed to survive. Sea World of San Diego also bred it and success- fully raised it making it the first successful breeding in the U.S .A. In Asia, the Jurong Bird Park keeps a colony of over 100 individual birds. They hatched a lasser Flamingo in 1991, but it was later killed by a Purple Swamphen Porphyria porhyrio. In the zoo guidebook of the Nihondaira Zoo in Japan, I found a picture of a Lesser Flamingo chick being hand raised, but no further infor- mation was available to me as to the results of this hatching.
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