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Roseate Spoonbill
Platalea ajaja
29.2022, -94.9602
Field Notes
Description:
A bizarre wading bird, the bright pink Roseate Spoonbill uses its odd bill to strain small food items out of the water. Like the American Flamingo, their pink color is diet-derived, consisting of the carotenoid pigment canthaxanthin. Another carotenoid, astaxanthin, can also be found deposited in flight and body feathers. The colors can range from pale pink to bright magenta, depending on age and location. Adults have a bare greenish head ("golden buff" when breeding) and a white neck, back, and breast (with a tuft of pink feathers in the center when breeding), and are otherwise a deep pink. The bill is grey.
Habitat:
Upper Texas Coast (UTC) 070 GALVESTON STATE PARK: Little remains of the once extensive barrier island habitats found along the Gulf and Atlantic coasts of North America. Beach resorts, coastal homes, and other development now dominate these lands. The small amount of relatively pristine habitat found in Galveston Island State Park is an important resource for many bird species. The property is in the path of the migration flyway used by most of the bird species that seasonally travel between North and South America. In the spring many birds make their first landfall on the island after flying over the Gulf.
Notes:
Fist of two spottings in the same pond
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