Originally published at: Nothing is cuter than watching a baby flamingo learn to stand on one leg | Boing Boing
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Why do they stand on one leg, anyway?
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Because if they stood on no legs they’d fall down.
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To minimize heat loss from contact with the air or water. No feathers to keep legs warm. At least, not unless the bird is one of those chickens with feather pantaloons.
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Is it just me, or was that kind of creepy?
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It’s a skill that every baby flamingo must master, but why? I did a quick search and it seems there are several theories, including:
-It is mechanically efficient, since they can lock their leg. (But if the legs are locked and not using much energy, why not use both legs for greater stability?)
-it saves heat since their legs are long and exposed. (But then when not evolve feathers down there?)
-They often have to stand in water that is contaminated by corrosive minerals (eg runoff from nearby volcanoes) and by standing on only one leg they can reduce the rate of skin corrosion.
Each of these sounds potentially plausible to me, but unfortunately data are sparse because there is limited funding to support the studies that would be needed to provide a definitive answer. So we are free to speculate….
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Birds aren’t real. They stand on one foot because the other foot is holding the controls to a space laser.
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I fully admit, Baby is doing much better at it than I would these days.
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The pumping action with their bent leg must be to develop a vacuum to hold the leg in the tucked position. Because their seals are not fully developed yet, they are unable to sustain a vacuum for very long and the leg drops. Give 'em a little time.
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To get to the other side?
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Because they spend a long time wading in water looking for food.
Feathers on their legs would do little to nothing for thermal insulation while doing that and add considerable drag, driving up energy consumption. Which would result in having to spend more time looking for food.
Wet feathers on their legs when leaving the water would mean extra weight to carry, making it harder to get airborne, i.e. harder to escape from whatever fancies flamingos for a snack. And drive up energy consumption. Walking around or standing on the beach with wet feathers would also drive up energy consumption. More weight to carry around, no thermal insulation. If they need to cool down their legs in hot weather they can just go and stand in the water again.
I think it’s mostly the “would make it harder to fly” bit, though. Flying is expensive because it takes a lot of energy.
Anyway, next time you’re on the beach, put on some long, loose-fitting trousers, wade around knee-deep for an hour, then rush out of the water and do a 100m sprint, then just stand on the beach for another hour.
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Nothing might be cuter than the video, but the screeches in the audio sound like a load of puppies being delivered into a wood chipper.
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Precisely, it’s an established fact.
Birds are everywhere, always watching. There are probably birds on this forum, standing on one leg and just looking at us right now.
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I agree, it has a sort of Junji Ito aesthetic.
I thought that the pumping was to create the vacuum in the sucker under the other foot, to firmly attach them to the lake bottom.
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I’ve heard this one in the context of “you think it is to save heat but really it’s this” and I am unconvinced. I’m sure flamingos are able to efficiently balance on one leg with their leg locked. But that doesn’t really answer the answer of why, plenty of other animals can efficiently balance on 2 or 4 legs, or for that matter none at all. Its doesn’t seem like there is anything intrinsically balanced about 1 leg standing, so it seems more likely that 1 leg standing is useful for other reasons and flamingos evolved to do so well.
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I found this article on the subject:
Not terribly in depth, but it does look like there was the idea they stood on one leg to keep the other warm, but it has failed to be replicated in subsequent studies. Instead it suggests it has something to do with unihemispheric sleep. But then it looks like subsequent studies don’t really support that either:
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.3184/175815618X15204318491767
So right now it looks like it is in fact kind of a mystery.
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That clinches it though, doesn’t it?
They do it to mess with our heads.
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