Shafaqna English– The fact that the local dialect lacks a specific term for flamingos perhaps best demonstrates how new these birds are to the Venetian Lagoon.
However, these pale pink birds — known as “fenicotteri” in Italian — are now arriving in Venice in unprecedented numbers. This surge is driven by ecological projects aimed at restoring damaged wetlands, which may expand their habitat and even encourage them to build nests within the lagoon.
Although flamingos are most famously associated with nesting sites in Spain and France, they began appearing in the expansive Venetian Lagoon in the early 2000s. Initially, they were spotted mainly in fishing valleys and mudflats on the lagoon’s outer edges, while sightings in the canal-rich historic center — the part of Venice most popular with global tourists — remained rare.
Source: Apnews