circular base to a 14-inch top, a depression about an inch deep at the top of
the cone holds one or two chalky-white eggs. If the nest is not disturbed
the flamingo will return to it the following year. If, on his arrival, he finds
his property has deteriorated, he builds additions of fresh mud. Some of
the re-built nests are over two feet high. The male and female take turns at
the hatching process; one sitting during the day and the other during the
night. Dr. Frank Chapman has given a vivid description of them in his
"Camps and Cruises of An Ornithologist:

"Without further delay, the birds returned to their homes.
They came on foot, a great red cohort marching steadily towards me.
I felt like a spy in an enemy's camp. Might not at least one pair of the
nearly four thousand eyes, detect something unnatural in the newly
grown brush almost within their city gates? No sign of alarm,
however, was shown; without confusion, and, as if trained to the
evolution, the birds advanced with stately tread to their nests. There
was a bowing of a forest of slender necks as each bird lightly touched
its egg or nest with its bill; then, all talking loudly they stood up on
their nests, the black and scarlet wings were waved for a moment and
bird after bird dropped forward on its egg. After a vigorous
wriggling motion, designed evidently to bring the egg into close
contact with the skin, the body was still but the long neck and head
were for a time in constant motion, preening, picking material at the
base of the nests, dabbling in a nearby puddle, or perhaps drinking