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A group of flamingos fly in the Venetian lagoon, in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n
A group of flamingos fly in the Venetian lagoon, in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n
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Sartori surveys the lagoon weekly by boat for signs of nesting, which would indicate a self-sustaining Venetian colony. So far there are no fresh signs after two nesting attempts, in 2008 and 2013, in northern lagoon fishing valleys suffered serious setbacks, including violent hail that killed dozens of birds.<\/p>\n
More than 90% of the birds counted in last year\u2019s census were in the northern lagoon, which contains a large area of natural salt marsh. The flamingos are also attracted by the traditional fishing valleys, semi-natural embanked wetlands that provide abundant food but can also bring them into conflict with human activity.<\/p>\n
Venice seeks to recover its lost marsh<\/p>\n
A project to reconstruct salt marshes in the more isolated southern lagoon \u2014 past the historic center and the industrial port \u2014 raises prospects that flamingo numbers will increase there as well by offering a new habitat in an area of the lagoon where wetland erosion has been especially severe. It could also draw the birds away from competing human uses in the north. <\/p>\n
The Venetian Lagoon, covering an expanse of 550 square kilometers (more than 200 square miles), was originally nearly half salt marsh. Today the area of salt marsh \u2014 or \u201cbarene\u201d in the Venetian dialect \u2014 is just about 7%, about half of it reconstructed, said Jane da Mosto, the executive director of We Are Here Venice, the local partner in the EU\u2019s 23.6 million euro ($27.5 million), 5-year WaterLANDS project to restore wetlands across Europe. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n A fisherman searches clams next to a flamingo in the Venetian lagoon in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n A fisherman searches clams next to a flamingo in the Venetian lagoon in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n Add AP News on Google <\/p>\n Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n Share<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n The damage is especially stark in the central and southern lagoon, due to the combination of natural erosion and the dredging of shipping channels to access the Marghera industrial port in the 1960s.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd since then, there\u2019s been much more widespread erosion and loss of sediments from the lagoon to the point that Venice is now on a trajectory to becoming a marine bay,\u201d said da Mosto. The wetlands reconstruction project \u201cis specifically to show that it\u2019s possible to address this trend and change the course of history.\u201d<\/p>\n Rebuilding the salt marshes increases the lagoon\u2019s ability to capture carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas and driver of climate change, and mitigates the effects of rising sea levels. But da Mosto said much larger areas would need to be restored to produce meaningful climate benefits. The goal of the EU project is to make salt marsh reconstruction scalable.<\/p>\n Flamingos can also benefit as biodiversity increases.<\/p>\n Da Mosto\u2019s team is researching ways to increase biodiversity on the reconstructed marshes, including planting species that can help reduce erosion and make the wetlands more resilient.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Fishermen sail on a small boat as a group of flamingos is seen in background in the Venetian lagoon, in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n Fishermen sail on a small boat as a group of flamingos is seen in background in the Venetian lagoon, in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n Add AP News on Google <\/p>\n Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n Share<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n The mudflat where they are working contains signs of flamingo activity, chiefly stray pink feathers. On a recent day, a flock of some 30 were perched in the distance \u2014 scattering when a pair of squawking oystercatchers alerted them to visitors.<\/p>\n Already, Sartori believes that the reconstruction has begun to draw more flamingos to the area. Over the last three years, he has seen their numbers in the southern lagoon grow from just a handful to as many as 300 to 400 in certain periods.<\/p>\n \u201cThe hope is that they can find \u2014 as they have found in other parts of the Mediterranean \u2014 right here on these barene, places where they can nest,\u201d Sartori said.<\/p>\n Venice\u2019s pink newcomers could draw a different kind of visitor<\/p>\n The flamingos\u2019 presence in the lagoon underlines the importance of the Venetian ecosystem and offers a new way for visitors to interpret the canaled city and outer islands through their ecological \u2014 and not just historical and artistic \u2014 significance.<\/p>\n Still, visitors to Venice who hope to casually spy flamingos will probably be disappointed, and AP reporters recently had to travel by boat for an hour to spot any. The flamingos inhabit shallow, difficult-to-access reaches of the lagoon where navigating safely requires close attention to tides and channels. Even at a distance, the birds are easily disturbed and quick to take flight.<\/p>\n Sartori predicts flamingo spotting \u2014 already a possibility from the shores of the small lagoon islands of Murano and Burano but rare in the historic center \u2014 could become more common as their numbers continue to grow.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously this should always be done with respect for the animals, keeping a safe distance and not interfering with their daily lives,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A group of flamingos react to human presence by raising their necks, in the Venetian lagoon, in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n A group of flamingos react to human presence by raising their necks, in the Venetian lagoon, in Venice, Italy, Monday, May 4, 2026. (AP Photo\/Luca Bruno)<\/p>\n Add AP News on Google <\/p>\n Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.<\/p>\n Share<\/p>\n Read More<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n This story has been corrected to show that the number of wintering flamingos in Venice increased by 6,000, not 8,000 as previously stated year.<\/p>\n ___<\/p>\n The Associated Press\u2019 climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP\u2019s standards<\/a> for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"VENICE, Italy (AP) \u2014 Perhaps nothing better illustrates the flamingo\u2019s status as a newcomer to the Venetian Lagoon…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":706122,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[26],"tags":[256717,2837,49,48,2848,2847,3456,2841,4996,256716,66,47815,323,883,10128],"class_list":["post-706121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-wildlife","tag-alessandro-sartori","tag-animals","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-climate","tag-climate-and-environment","tag-europe","tag-general-news","tag-italy","tag-jane-da-mosto","tag-science","tag-wetlands","tag-wildlife","tag-world-news","tag-zoology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/706121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=706121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/706121\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/706122"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=706121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=706121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=706121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/1780246570_551_.jpeg\")
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