TWIST AND SHOUT

Get ready for a dazzling show as courting birds show off their groovy moves and fabulous colours

- Mike Dilger

WHEN IT COMES TO DANCING AND dressing to impress, flamingos are capable of putting on an extravagant spectacle with the pizzazz to match any West End or Broadway show. These birds of a feather are, of course, dancing together to find a mate for the breeding season.

Four species are distributed across the Americas, with another two found across Africa, parts of southern Europe, the Middle East and Asia. All six species are capable of complex mating displays, but most research has been conducted into the routines of the two Old World species - the greater and lesser flamingos.

Flamingos spend most of their lives in the shallow waters of lagoons and lakes, some of which are characterised by a very high salt content that occasionally hits an unbelievably caustic 11 on the pH scale. The birds are specially adapted for filter-feeding on the small aquatic organisms that also live in these hyper-saline environments. They use their upside-down bills to draw in water and mud, before pushing it out the sides of their bills through thousands of tiny plates known as lamellae that trap algae, diatoms, crustaceans, insect larvae and molluscs. It is the carotenoid pigments present in this food that gives flamingo plumage its striking pinkish tones.