Birds That Look Like Flamingos

Flamingos are wading birds with long necks and legs. These social birds live in groups and have strongly hooked downward-facing beaks which they use to feed on shrimp and other small water creatures. And they are famous for their stunning pink color. With such a distinctive appearance you wouldn’t think they could be confused for any other bird on the planet. However, there are a handful of birds that look like flamingos and here they are.

Herons

With their long legs and necks, herons have a similar body type to flamingos, and some species are quite large. You won’t find any pink herons though, as no heron species actually has any pink plumage.

Unlike the downward-bending beak of flamingos, herons have long harpoon-like beaks which they use to spear their food. Different from flamingos and other waterbirds that fly with their necks outstretched, herons in contrast always fly with their necks retracted. This feature makes it easy to identify them in the air.

Storks

These large flamingo looking birds have long and pointy beaks that are both larger and heavier than that of flamingos. Storks also usually live in drier habitats than flamingos as well. They are big carnivorous birds that are known for making extremely large nests and in European folklore for delivering babies. Unlike flamingos which are fully feathered some stork species such as the marabou stork, for instance, have bare heads.

Spoonbills

Spoonbills get their name from their long and flat spoon-like beaks, which are of course quite different from that of the flamingo. While they are large wading birds, they are not as tall as flamingos and have shorter and thicker necks.

The roseate spoonbill in particular is often misidentified as a flamingo because of its pink plumage. These pink birds that look like flamingos, like the flamingo itself, get their pink color from the carotenoid pigment found in their diet of shrimp and crustaceans.

Cranes

Like the other birds listed here, cranes are wading birds. However, these streamlined, long-necked, and large-bodied birds don’t solely stay in wetlands as flamingos do. Another difference from their pink counterparts is that most cranes ( all but two species) have bare skin on their faces. This bare area of skin is used to communicate with other cranes as it can be both expanded and even change color.

Ibises

Ibises can quickly be differentiated from flamingos by their beaks. That’s because the beak of an ibis is not only longer and narrower than that of a flamingo but slopes downward at a much lesser angle as well. Ibises are also smaller and have shorter legs than flamingos.

However, there is one species of ibis, which is probably the bird most often misidentified as a flamingo: the scarlet ibis. This is due to its striking deep pink plumage, which like the flamingo and roseate spoonbill is a result of its carotenoid-rich diet. This diet causes the pigment canthaxanthin to accumulate in the skin and feathers giving the birds their color. Because of its small size, the scarlet ibis is usually confused for a baby flamingo.

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