Talk:American flamingo

Possible Woozle of drinking boiling water

The claim appears here in October 2013, by a user (Beebss5) who seems to have very few other contributions. It has propagated since then through the internet, but always as an unsourced claim probably coming from here.

Searching pre-2013 has lead to a couple of notes of Flamingos drinking very hot water, and other flamingos are well known for living in hot (sometimes described as boiling but in the sense of hot not 100 degree) water, but I am unable to find an actual source or account of an American Flamingo drinking boiling (I am defining as 95+ degrees) water.

Flamingos seem to drink 70 degree water but then so can humans, so them drinking "boiling" water isn't really a claim we should propagate. If Flamingos are specifically adapted to drinking 80-90 degree water (which I think is a reasonable and likely adaptation), that is a specific claim we should back up with a source, but vaguely mentioning in the section on osmoregulation that they can drink boiling water is a potentially dangerous, and at this point wide spread, claim.

If someone can find something like that that would be great, my local libraries do not seem to have anything that could support or refute this claim. If not, I will delete this claim in a couple months. The damage has been done, and this factoid has taken on a life of its own, but we can at least try. Aethelred The Ready (talk) 14:29, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

I think the claim is highly dubious. Just remove it. - UtherSRG (talk) 14:55, 20 February 2025 (UTC)

Its kinda, just on that threashold of believability (which I think helped it become a fun factoid). I'll remove it, with the Talk page its probably not going to be willy-nilly readded, and I've reached out to a friends friend who might know someone who could verify it for possible later re-addition. Aethelred The Ready (talk) 15:04, 20 February 2025 (UTC)