EPOW - Ecology Picture of the Week

Planet Flamingo

Lesser Flamingos (Phoenicopterus minor), Family Phoenicopteridae
Lake Nakuru, Kenya, Africa

Explanation:  This week's main photo looks all the world like ... well, a world populated by nothing but Lesser Flamingos. 

This week we are in Lake Nakuru in the Rift Valley of southern Kenya, east Africa.  This highly saline lake -- also known as a soda lake with a highly alkaline pH -- produces vast amounts of  algae invertebrates which are scooped up by thousands of flamingos.  

Flamingos are naturally white in color; they adopt the pink hue from their food source.  

They feed by dipping their head into the water with the bill upside down, scooping up sediment and invertebrates with a sideways motion.  They then strain out sediment and water with their tongue, retaining food particles that they then swallow.  Thus, in this way, they feed much like baleen whales do.  

In times of local drought, the flamingos leave Lake Nakuru in favor of other Rift Valley lakes. 
  

  
Lake Nakuru has plenty of invertebrates to offer, boasting populations of phytoplankton, zooplankton, copepods, rotifers, and aquatic insects ... and a salt-tolerant species of Tilapia fish introduced to feed on and reduce the mosquito population.  
  

White and pink feathers cover much of the lake surface!