‘Selfie’ flamingos in Caribbean resorts are being returned to the wild

At several resorts in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic, flamingos wander the grounds, wading through artificial ponds and foraging any bits of food dropped by tourists. 

Visitors post photos and videos of themselves getting close to the birds on social media, attracted to the exoticism of the pink, leggy animals against the backdrop of a tropical beach vacation.

But behind the charming social media posts, things are less rosy for the flamingos.

Though the International Union for Conservation of Nature lists the Caribbean—also known as the American—flamingo as “of least concern,” anecdotal evidence suggests the population is declining on the Caribbean island, says Maria Milagros Paulino, director of the Dominican nonprofit Grupo Accion Ecologica.

“When you see flamingos, you see them in groups, so it gives the appearance that they are numerous,” Paulino says through a translator.

The phenomenon of flamingos living at resorts had been trending upward for years, especially in the Bávaro region of Punta Cana, says Eladio Fernandez, a Dominican conservationist and photographer. In 2020, he conducted an informal census of how many birds lived in Bávaro resorts by scrolling through TripAdvisor photos. It’s not known exactly how the flamingos arrived at the various resorts and who is involved in bringing the birds there. (Read about Flamingo Bob, the Caribbean poster bird for conservation.)

According to Fernandez, personnel from the hotels themselves don’t know where the flamingos came from, in some cases they’ve been there a long time and personnel rotate in and out.

In 2020, he counted 163 flamingos in 41 hotels. Anywhere between a thousand and 3,000 Caribbean flamingos live in the Dominican Republic. Since those birds don’t breed, they’re not replenishing the population, Fernandez says.

So, in collaboration with the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources, the National Zoo in Santo Domingo, and Grupo Accion Ecologica, he spent three years coordinating and fundraising to launch a nonprofit called Rescate Rosado, which translates to “pink rescue” in Spanish.

Ministry employees pick up the flamingos, then transfer them to Rescate Rosado and zoo employees, who eventually release them back into the wild, Fernandez says. So far, the nonprofit has removed 66 birds from resorts in the Dominican Republic—and they say they’re just getting started. 

Nelson García Marcano, the Dominican Republic’s director of the Department of Biodiversity and Wildlife of the Ministry of Environment, removes a flamingo from a Bávaro resort. This animal is part of the Rescate Rosado’s first-ever rescue.

Because of the efforts to remove the flamingos, there should be fewer than a hundred living at Bávaro resorts—but it’s difficult to know for sure, Fernandez says.

Death traps

On the other side of the country, at Monte Cristi National Park, the pristine resort environment is nowhere to be found. Instead, there are salty lagoons and muddy mangrove swamps accessible only by motorcycle.

This is the natural habitat for Caribbean flamingos; it’s also a popular trapping site. And it is here that Paulino, a collaborator with Rescate Rosado, works to remove the traps, which are made of wooden stakes attached to two lassos of fishing wire.

Paulino’s group first noticed the traps in 2009 and has been reporting them to the authorities ever since, but the practice hasn’t stopped, and is expected to pick up again this winter and spring, Fernandez says. Once, Paulino says, she spotted a trapper carrying nine flamingos in a bag. On a trip early in 2023, Grupo Ecologico took 706 traps from three locations. (Read why birds matter, and are worth protecting.)

The crude method of trapping can also harm, or even kill, the birds, which Fernandez has seen firsthand in the field. A flamingo could be walking around and “all of a sudden their leg falls in the lasso and when they pull, they’re caught,” says Fernandez. They could be trapped by a knee or an ankle, and struggle to break free, which exhausts them, especially as the water bogs down their wings.

The trappers, meanwhile, might not come back for days, leaving the birds—or any other animals caught in the device—in a precarious position. “It’s a death trap for the flamingo if they don’t get pulled out soon,” Fernandez says.

The first time Fernandez went to Monte Cristi National Park to look for traps with Paulino, they found a dead flamingo still in a trap. It had likely been there for months.

Birds in trouble

“Some [resort flamingos] are well taken care of, and others aren’t,” Fernandez says.

Some of these flamingos have their secondary feathers cut, which thwarts flight, as Fernandez has observed. Others have a bone surgically removed from their wings, he says. This grounds the bird for life, which can be up to 60 years, says Fernandez. It is not known who cuts the feathers or removes the bones.

Several resorts housing flamingos declined to be interviewed for this article.

Fernandez has also witnessed flamingos being given pet food, which eventually fades the vibrant pink color that comes from eating their native diet of shrimp and other small crustaceans. The birds change behaviorally as well, becoming used to people and soliciting them for food, as Fernandez has seen.

But there’s at least one trait the flamingos perhaps haven’t lost. Fernandez has seen one instance in which flamingos, which form tight social bonds, stayed by the side of a captive wing-clipped companion.

Two former flamingo hunters are working with the project, sharing their knowledge of trapping. And people are calling out influencers on social media who post photos of the resort flamingos.

On a bigger scale, Fernandez will participate in a formal flamingo census in 2024, which he hopes may lead to the species being listed as endangered in the Dominican Republic.

“This is something we can fix. We can right a wrong,” Fernandez said.

An emotional release

In February 2023, guests watched as eight flamingos were removed from a Bávaro resort that cooperated with the rescue. The birds, wrapped in pantyhose to keep them immobilized, were transported in a pickup truck to the national zoo, where they were examined.

The conditions of the birds varied, says Tatiana Carreño Pinto, a zoo veterinarian. Some were underweight, whereas some are too heavy to fly, but all were generally healthy.

Tatiana Carreño, a veterinarian at the National Zoo of the Dominican Republic, is moved and cries when she sees the newly released flamingos flying. 

Once vets examine the birds, they’re put in an isolated corral for two to three months, and, in this controlled setting, deliberately frightened to regain their natural fear of people. (Learn how pinker flamingos can be more aggressive.)

One morning later that month, scientists loaded 12 flamingos into a truck and drove them to Monte Cristi National Park. Once there, veterinarians massaged their legs to promote circulation.

Then, a boat transported the birds to the lagoon, where another corral awaited them under black mangrove trees. They opened their wings and walked in the confined space, where the flamingos would adjust to their new environment.

The next morning, it was go time. The 12 flamingos, seven of which were from resorts, flew or walked away into the lagoon as the rescue team watched, Fernandez says.

“It was very emotional,” Pinto says in Spanish. “It was inevitable to cry.”

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