A flamingo spotted on Cape Cod in Massachusetts in spring 2024.
It seems the flamingo that caused quite a stir in Massachusetts has flown the Cape and may now be on Long Island, according to an expert.
The flamingo was spotted by at least two people on Cape Cod, including in the bayside town of Dennis, but there haven't been any more sightings in the area, according to Mark Faherty, science coordinator for Mass Audubon Cape Cod.
"It seems to be back in Long Island," he told NBC10 Boston Friday.
There have been recent sightings on Long Island, about a week after a flamingo was spotted there, Faherty said, but this time about 60 miles closer to New York City. A flamingo was sighted Wednesday by people near Cedar Beach Marina, according to Cornell University's eBird app, where birders log the animals they see.
That means the flamingo -- if it is the same one -- is continuing to enjoy popular vacation spots. Its first New York sighting was first seen in Easthampton, part of New York's tony Hamptons community, and the new location is close to New York's Fire Island.
Faherty noted that he measured the distance from Easthampton to Dennis at 114 miles, "which is nothing for a big bird."
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Images of the bird at a Cape Cod beach were circulating on social media the first weekend of June, and were shared with NBC10 Boston Tuesday. The bird can be seen wading in the water off shore.
If the flamingo is found to be wild, it would be the first American flamingo ever confirmed to have visited the Bay State on its own, Faherty has said.
American flamingos typically stick to Florida and points south, and sightings outside of Florida are usually linked with escapes from captivity or hurricanes — a hurricane this September dispersed some, and the birds were spotted in strange new places, like Wisconsin and Ohio, according to Faherty.
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"The thinking is it's just some bird that was displaced by the hurricane back then that doesn't know where it lives anymore," he told NBC10 Boston earlier this week.
