As El Niño disrupts the shallow water ecosystems flamingos depend on, unusual sightings near Mulund Hills may tell us more about Mumbai's ecological future than its past.
When large migratory bird populations
shift their patterns, ecologists pay attention. Not because the birds are in
danger — flamingos are highly adaptable, and a single season of movement does
not constitute a crisis — but because birds, particularly flamingos, are among
the most reliable ecological indicators available. They respond to changes in
water quality, food availability, temperature, and habitat integrity faster and
more accurately than most monitoring systems.
This season in Mumbai, they are
responding to something.
Thane Creek and Vashi have hosted
Mumbai's flamingo population for well over two decades, providing the specific
combination of shallow saline water, abundant cyanobacteria, and Artemia
crustaceans that Greater and Lesser Flamingos rely on for nutrition. The
ongoing El Niño cycle — one of the most significant on record — has disrupted
this balance in measurable ways. Increased evaporation rates have altered
salinity levels. Irregular rainfall has affected freshwater inflow. The algae
bloom that typically peaks between February and April has been inconsistent.
The birds noticed before the data caught
up.
Reports of flamingo sightings near Mulund
Hills — an area not traditionally associated with flamingo activity — have been
growing over the past several weeks. The ecology of the area is instructive:
higher elevation, proximity to the Sanjay Gandhi National Park buffer zone,
access to cleaner freshwater drainage from the Sahyadri foothills, and
significantly lower industrial disturbance than the Thane Creek corridor.
These are conditions that flamingos
actively seek when their primary habitats are compromised.
It would be premature to conclude that
Mumbai's flamingos are permanently relocating. El Niño cycles are temporary,
and traditional habitats often recover once conditions normalise. However, the
Mulund sightings raise an important parallel question: have we been
undervaluing the ecological potential of Mumbai's northern hill corridors?
If flamingos — which make their decisions
based on nothing other than the quality of the environment — are finding Mulund
Hills worth investigating, that assessment carries weight that no real estate
survey or air quality index can quite replicate.
The birds are telling us something. Whether Mumbai chooses to listen is a different question.
