Look: 5 Baby Flamingos Hatch At Detroit Zoo

ROYAL OAK — The Detroit Zoological Society (DZS) is tickled pink to announce the hatching of five flamingo chicks in recent weeks. The hatchlings – four greater flamingos and one Chilean flamingo – are being reared by their parents and foster parents in the Detroit Zoo's African bird habitat across from the great apes.

Bird care staff pulled the five flamingo eggs from the habitat for artificial incubation to ensure successful hatching and survivability. Once the hatchlings were introduced to the flock, raising them became a job for both parents, who guard the chicks and feed them a nutrient-rich "crop milk" produced in their upper digestive track. Flamingo chicks hatch with straight, short beaks; as they wean from the crop milk and learn to eat an adult diet, their beaks begin to curve downward.

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