Release of flamingo to mark World Wildlife Day

A flamingo nursed back to health will be released at Akrotiri salt lake on Thursday on the occasion of World Wildlife Day, celebrated annually on March 3 to mark the signing in 1973 of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

The event is being organised by the game service in cooperation with the Akrotiri Environmental Education Centre.

The game service said the theme of this year’s world day is recovering key species for ecosystem restoration.

The flamingo, exhausted and weak, was found in a coastal area by members of the public last autumn. It was taken into the care of the game service’s centre for the treatment and recovery of wild life and is now ready to return to its natural habitat, the game service added.

It will be fitted with a special transmitter that will collect information on its movements and behaviour more generally, providing valuable data.

A similar transmitter had been fitted on a flamingo that was rescued in 2015 and provided important information on its movement in Cyprus and the Middle East for several years, the game service said.

Every year, thousands of flamingos flock to Cyprus’s salt lakes of Larnaca and Akrotiri in the winter in search of warmer climes, and food. Environmental authorities have urged the public not to approach the birds in their natural habitat, nor fly drones above them, as they might get agitated.