The Greater flamingo network (GFN) for the study and conservation of greater flamingos started in March 2002 with a workshop that brought together the first collaborators in the Mediterranean. Researchers from Türkiye (Erciyes University), Spain (Estación Biológica de Doñana, Reserva Natural de Fuente de Piedra), and Italy (Associazione per il Parco Molentargius Saline, Istituto Nazionale per la Fauna Selvatica) gathered at Tour du Valat in the Camargue to discuss the establishment of a research network aimed at pooling their knowledge in order to make better use of it. More on this first workshop by downloading the proceedings.

The network became operational in late 2002, relying upon the launch of a collaborative and shared database for ring resightings of banded flamingos in France, Spain, and Italy (SIAM database) developed by Christophe Germain.

In 2003, we expanded the network to Mauritania, where flamingos breed annually in the Banc d’Arguin National Park, and to Turkey, where the first flamingo banding operation was organized in the Gediz Delta. The network was strengthened following a second workshop held after the XIth Pan-African Ornithological Congress in November 2004 in Djerba (Tunisia), which enabled researchers from Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco to join the network. The proceedings were published in a special issue of Ostrich – African journal of ornithology.

In 2007, a workshop organized in Antequera (Spain) allowed sharing the first results of the collaborative effort and provided an update of the situation in each partner country. The proceedings were published as a supplementary issue of the Flamingo specialist group newsletter.

In December 2009, a workshop was organised at Tour du Valat with a specific focus on dispersal including genetic approaches. Two other workshops were organised back to back of the 3rd and 4th International Flamingo Symposiums, in 2014 in San Diego (USA) and in 2025 in Venice (Italy), respectively. The proceedings of the 2014 workshop can be downloaded here.

The proceedings of the 2025 workshop is in preparation and will be available here soon.

Standardized protocols and guide of good practices for flamingo monitoring and study🠉

Since its beginning the Greater Flamingo network established standardized protocols to record different kinds of data, from the count of flamingos to ringing protocols and the report of ring resightings. Hence, the GFN now provides standardized protocols for the monitoring of breeding colonies and the ringing and ring resightings.

Whenever you read a flamingo ring in the field, please consider reporting its behaviour following the downloadable table of behavioural codes below and send your observation to flamingoring@tourduvalat.org. Click on the wanted following link to download the table of behaviour codes in:

• English
• Español
• Français
• Italiano
• Português
• Türkçe
• Українська

Whenever you count flamingos on a breeding colony, please consider reporting numbers on the dedicated page on this portal.

All known breeding colonies are on this map where circle size is proportional to the average size of the colonies:

Please, let us know if you are aware of a new colony that would deserve being monitored.