Fact Check: Viral video of flamingos’ arrival makes a false claim, it is from Kazakhstan, not Mumbai
As temperatures drop, Mumbai welcomes pink visitors flying from Kutch, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Africa and Turkey.
As temperatures drop, Mumbai welcomes pink visitors flying from Kutch, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Africa and Turkey. Every year thousands of flamingos migrate to Mumbai around November making the city’s wetlands their home for a few months. They migrate here mostly in search of food and water. They favour shorelines and intertidal lakes that have marshy conditions and algae-rich waters.
One of the popular destinations to spot flamingos in India is Thane Creek. Thane Creek is the second marine sanctuary in Maharashtra. In August 2015, the Maharashtra government declared it an ‘Important Bird Area and Flamingo Sanctuary”. Since 1994, people have spotted various species of migratory birds at the sanctuary. Flamingos come to Thane Creek every year to feed on the multiplying blue-green algae. Before flying to their breeding grounds, they stay here for six to seven months in winter.
As the winter season has arrived, the flamingos also have started to migrate to Mumbai from various places. In the view of this migration, a video is in circulation claiming that the pink visitors have arrived in Mumbai. The video is shared with the caption “Entry into Navi Mumbai. The winter guests have arrived on time!”
Here is the Archive link of the claim.
Fact Check:
The claim is Misleading. The video is not from Kazakhstan.
When we extracted the keyframes from the viral video and searched it using Google reverse image search, we found that the video was published in 2020 by several social media platforms. A Facebook post by Fox 10 Phoenix was published in November 2020 with the caption “FLOCKING FLAMINGOS: The flamingos of Lake Karakol in Kazakhstan migrate south as winter approaches, creating what seems like a floating, pink island in the middle of the water”
The article published by Fox 10 Phoenix states that a flock of flamingos was spotted on Lake Karakol near Aktau, Kazakhstan, on November 14, moving in harmony during their migration south. Drone footage shot by Azamat Sarsenbayev shows the mass of pink birds floating and flying near the lake’s surface. According to a Google Translation of a local news report, the flamingos often appear near Aktau during their migration, after which they fly south to the Khazar nature reserve in Turkmenistan or further to Iran.
The same video was shared by Facebook page of CBS News with the Caption “Watch as hundreds of pink flamingos rest on a lake in Kazakhstan.
Another article states that Aktau resident Azamat Sarsenbayev recently stunned the Kazakh social media after releasing a video featuring pink flamingos near Lake Karakol in the Mangistau region. A video drone footage went viral overnight. Flamingos fly to the Mangystau region every autumn on their way to the Khazar reserve or further to Iran. Locals observed the first flock of birds early October on Karakol Lake. Birds arrived from the lakes Tengiz and Korgalzhyn located at the Korgalzhyn State Nature Reserve, which is an important wetland site for migratory water birds. The reserve is listed in the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization’s (UNESCO) World Biosphere Reserve Network. The number of flamingos arriving in Kazakhstan annually is approximately 50,000-100,000 birds.
India Today also shared the viral video in the year 2020 stating that thousands of flamingos leave Kazakhstan as they embark on a long journey down south as it gets cold.
Hence, the viral video in circulation is from Kazakhstan and not Mumbai. Though it is the migration season for flamingos and they reach Navi Mumbai in thousands, the viral video was not shot in Mumbai. The claim is Misleading.