F is for Fabulous Flamingos
This is for part 3 of my creative writing challenge. As you’ll see by the title I am going to be writing about flamingos.
It’s just another day here for me and the other flamingos in our pen at the zoo. It’s not as bad as you think. We get a plentiful supply of our favourite food, blue-green algae and brine shrimp. Some people are confused about how we eat, but my flamingo friends and I do it by filter feeding. The colour of our feathers comes from our diet of animals like shrimp and plant plankton. I think these contain something the humans call carotenoids.
Speak of the devil here come the humans to feed us our daily brine shrimp, yum. It’s normally a race between me and the others for the food because they only give us so much in the day. I feel I’m usually first, but I know in my head I’m not, haha.
Once we have all eaten, we pretty much do what we want. I think it’s funny that some of the others, like Helga, go and stand in the water doing nothing for about an hour or two. You would think they might get bored. I do something different each day. For instance, today I’m helping look after all the new babies. Yesterday I was asleep for a lot of it apart from when I was performing for visitors, showing them how well I could balance one leg. Did you know, most birds lose heat through their feet and legs. We find holding one leg up under our body helps us stay warmer.
A couple of days ago, I heard the humans saying we will have to close the zoo due to something. I couldn’t hear what it was exactly, so I kept it to myself. I didn’t want to send the rest of my family into panic mode. One of the keepers said they would move into the zoo to help out more and not worry about spreading it. I will hopefully not need to tell the flock about the things the keepers said, and it will all be sorted out.
Well, I have to leave now to do my bit with helping the flock by looking after the babies. I hope it all goes well, and please do try to help out too. Don’t be one of those like Helga and stand around all day, do your bit to help the zoo’s, please.
