Posted by
NidalM
on
Aug 29th, 2009 |
32 comments
An hours drive north from Navisha (three hours from Nairobi), lies one of the most breathtaking sights in Kenya. Lake Nakuru is a salty lake located in Kenya’s rift valley. The prevalence of algae in the waters make the lake an ideal home for flamingos which cover the entire lake. And by cover, I really mean it. Literally. Cover. As in like millions of PINK little birds. Readers of this blog will not be surprised to learn, that given my strong affinity towards Enrique, I am also a great lover of the color PINK.
Lake Nakuru is surrounded and protected by a wildlife conservation: The Nakuru National Park. While not as large as some of the other parks in Kenya, Nakuru easily makes up for it in pure aesthetic appeal!
Bird layer pie! The shores of Lake Nakuru are inhabited by several species of birds. Ranging from Marble Storks and Pelicans to the blatantly obvious (and PINK!) flamingos!
The algae in the lake makes the shores an ideal habitation spot for flamingos….
… and the birds that call flamingos food. White meat? Red meat? or PINK meat : -D
Did I mention there were a lot of flamingos? Literally, millions. Sadly pictures don’t capture sound. Imagine standing at the edge of this lake, listening to the squawking of millions of birds. It’s truly an unreal experience.
… PINK
The flamingos inhabit the entire shoreline of the lake. Nakuru is 5km across and 10km long. Lets do some math. Estimating lake perimeter as an ellipse: Circumference of ellipse with a=5km and b=10km using
calculus is approximately 25km. Approximate average width of flamingo habitation is say 8m and assumed flamingo density is 10 per meter squared. Calculating it out, this gives us an approximate population of 2 million flamingos in lake Nakuru. See, I told you there were MILLIONS. Also, I am a huge math nerd. By the way, if you think I’m making this up, a population consensus of Nakuru flamingos in 1973 found
1.5 million birds. 2 million is perfectly reasonable estimate for 2009, give or take a few hundred thousand.
At dusk, the flamingos seem to suddenly become active, and thousands take to the skies, shrieking and doing their dance.
“Just you and Me” …because you’re one in a million. Dedicated to that special someone
Up next (And I promise not to take long!): Theres more to Nakuru than Flamingos! Lions, Rhinos and Warthogs at Nakuru National Park!
Tags:
birds, kenya, lake, nakuru, wildlife
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