Thanks to this massive rescue effort, this year’s lesser flamingo breeding season at Kamfers Dam will have a silver lining. The chicks are growing, preening and sunning in their enclosure (video below). Terry Grendzinski feeding a rescued baby flamingo, Feb 2019 (photo courtesy the National Aviary) Click here to watch a video of the feeding. In the photo below she feeds one of the rescued chicks while wearing pink sleeves and back gloves to mimic the appearance of the chick’s parents. Terry Grendzinski, Supervisor of Animal Collections and avian specialist, knows all about raising baby flamingos so she flew to the SANCCOB rescue center in Cape Town.

South Africans made a worldwide plea for volunteers. Added to that is the challenge of not allowing them to imprint on their human rescuers. Then the hard work began - three to four months of feeding and monitoring thousands of flamingo chicks, many of whom arrived in bad shape from dehydration and starvation. Rescuing a Kamfers Dam flamingo chick (screenshot from Saam Staan Kimberley on Facebook Video of Kamfers Dam flamingo rescue by Saam Staan Kimberley on FacebookĢ,000 flamingo chicks and eggs, some in the process of hatching, were rescued by volunteers and taken to shelters around South Africa. Click here or on the screenshot below to see a video of the rescue posted by Saan Staan Kimberley on Facebook.

The flamingos abandoned their desiccated colony, so people went out to rescue the chicks. The lake level could not be restored by the water treatment plant because of their own failing infrastructure. In January, because of severe drought and high evaporation, a large part of the lake went dry. Lesser flamingos at Kamfers Dam in 2008, a wet year (photo from Wikimedia Commons) Kamfers Dam is one of only six lesser flamingo breeding sites in the world and an international birding hotspot … until this year. S-shaped island, lesser flamingo breeding colony at Kamfers Dam as seen from the air (photo from Wikimedia Commons) At the height of the breeding season it’s covered in tens of thousands of flamingos. In 2006 people noticed that the lake attracted a Near Threatened species, lesser flamingos ( Phoeniconaias minor), so they built an S-shaped breeding island for them (pin on map above). The site was originally an ephemeral wetland but became a permanent lake thanks to runoff and treated wastewater from the town of Kimberley. Kamfers Dam is a privately owned dam just north of Kimberley, about halfway between Johannesburg and Cape Town, South Africa. If the colony stayed, all would die so they abandoned this year’s breeding attempt - eggs and chicks - to live and breed again. Incubating adults were dying of dehydration.

The lake usually provides food and their island provides shelter but the water was gone. When severe drought, high temperatures and failing infrastructure hit Kamfers Dam in Kimberley, South Africa, the lesser flamingo colony that nests there was forced to make a dreadful choice. A rescued lesser flamingo chick in South Africa, Feb 2019 (photo courtesy the National Aviary)

Baby flamingo