Flamingos in Mumbai?!

Last weekend, I bought the latest issue of "Time Out Mumbai," a magazine that has what is happening each week in the city. As I was flipping through I saw "Flamingo festival." The pink feathered bird being my favorite, I was curious. Lo and behold, there is a flamingo migration in Mumbai! This being my birthday weekend (My birthday following on a Wednesday, I actually feel like I have two this year :)), I let Greg know I wanted to search out these algae-eating beauties.

Yesterday we hopped on the Central Line and headed south with Reid, Rachel, Toni, and Mark. Mark and I had been looking at the tide schedules and agreed that getting to Sewri mud flats after low tide would be time we would likely find the flamingos strutting about. With no problems getting the train down to the Sewri station (the Centrll Line has been an issue for Greg and I and we had recently done laps on it with my dad and Alison), we headed east, towards the water in the hot sun. We walked down a dusty road in an industrial area, lined with water trucks waiting to cart their load off to eagerly expecting people. We started to see some mangroves, which line the water and are a haven for bird life, but rapidly disappearing in Mumbai due to development. The area along the road was strewn with some trash and murky water, typical of Mangrove areas, though this was much cleaner than some areas we have encountered. Further down the road, we could see some very old and decrepit boats testing in the mud flats. As the mangroves thinned near the boats, you could see across the bay to the industry lining the banks and amidst this seen were thousands of pink dots. I expected to spot some flamingos here and there, but this was amazing! We all laughed at the typical extremes seen all over the city and this one: a flamingo bird migration in the center of industrialized Mumbai. This scene is much different than the last time I saw flamingos when I was 13 driving into the Rift Valley in Kenya. But, we all enjoyed watching the birds feeding, strutting and occasionally taking a short flight to resettle back into feeding.
No one is quite sure where the flamingos migrate to or from (not sure why this hasn't been studied yet), but they are in Mumbai for about 6 months, from the end of one monsoon season, to the beginning of the next. So, they will be around for about another month and I highly recommend getting out to see them. Bring water and a hat as the sun is pretty intense out there right now.