In recent summers in East Hampton, New York, many people have woken up early in the hope of catching a glimpse of Jay-Z on one of his early morning walks among the residential mansions of tycoons such as David Zaslav, David Geffen and Ron Perelman. .
But this season, the world’s most successful rapper seems to have been upstaged by a new star in town: a wild American flamingo that has drawn hundreds of spectators in recent weeks.
He apparently arrived in this financial enclave of celebrities, plutocrats and tourists last month, taking up residence at Lake Georgica, a brackish coastal lake located between East Hampton and Wainscott. The first to spot the strange bird was Cathy Blinken, a senior marketing manager at Amazon Web Services who spends time at the lake with her husband, David Blinken, a first cousin of Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken.
Ms. Blinken immediately called The East Hampton Star, which sent a reporter and photographer to break the story of the creature’s arrival. Over the next few days, those who visited Lake Georgica to see the vagrant flamingo for themselves ended up disappointed. The bird had flown.
Days later, a flamingo with the same plumage was spotted basking about 200 miles away, off the coast of Cape Cod Bay in Massachusetts. It seemed the bird might have been one of those fliers who, after exploring various summer outposts in the Northeast, had found Cape Cod preferable to the scenic grandeur of the scene-obsessed Hamptons.
But on June 9, Pietro Cicognani, an East Hampton architect, spotted the bird and called The Star, which quickly published a follow-up to his scoop.
Jim Colligan, an avid birder who served as a city councilman on nearby Shelter Island, helped spread the word about the flamingo’s return. On Tuesday he found himself driving in the car of another local resident, Steven Spielberg, to get a glimpse of the village’s main attraction.
As Mr. Spielberg drove, Mr. Colligan led him down a sandy path surrounded by partridge vines and into an entrance near the end of West End Road, not far from the former home of Kelly Klein, Calvin Klein’s ex-wife . From there, it was easy to spot the flamingo in the lake. This was due less to its distinctive plumage and more to its stilt-like legs, which allowed it to wade through the shallows with the gait of a Louboutin-clad supermodel.
The flamingo went into a jingle-like routine — it flexed its right leg, then its left, then its right again. After that, it lowered its head into the water to dig up algae and invertebrates from the floor with its hooked beak. On the other side of the pond, nearly a dozen birds stood with binoculars and cameras.
More fans appeared as the week went on. Kerry Lyons, a day tripper from Westchester County, New York, nearly doubled over when she was told there was a flamingo in the lake.
“Really;” he said. “Shut up!”
A bird in a Hawaiian shirt invited Mrs. Lyon to look through his telescope, and her doubts were replaced by questions about how on earth it had gotten there.
“Wrong turn?” asked.
According to Jerry Lorenz, marine biologist and director of research for Audubon Florida, the wrong turn theory is indeed plausible.
In a telephone interview, Mr. Lorenz said that Hurricane Idalia, which swept through Florida in August 2023, may have had something to do with the bird’s arrival in the Hamptons. To escape the storm, flocks of flamingos flew north, leading to rare sightings of the colorful creatures in Kentucky, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
Most of these birds returned to where they came from. But it is not unusual for a flamingo to become separated from a flock, either because it is disoriented or because its friends are killed, Mr. Lorenz said. Some enthusiasts, he noted, may just decide to go exploring.
“There are examples of a flamingo being alone for years,” said Mr. Lorenz, continuing to tell the story of Peaches, a flamingo who spent years living in the wild at the St. Marks in the Florida Panhandle. , shedding several flocks before making some friends after last year’s hurricane season.
“Then he left with them,” she said.
Flamingos are found all over the world, from the tropics to the Andes in South America. They get their characteristic hue from the carotenoid pigments in the crustaceans and algae that make up their diet. Tough and robust, they can fly up to 40 miles per hour, according to the American Bird Conservancy.
They tend to make news when they stray from their usual habitats. In 1964, the New York Times reported a flamingo sighting in Niantic, Conn. An African flamingo that escaped from a zoo in Wichita, Kan., in 2005 was still making headlines in 2022 when it was spotted in Port Lavaca, Texas. Pink Floyd, a flamingo that escaped from an aviary in Salt Lake City, lived on the Great Salt Lake for part of every year from 1988 to 2005.
The Hamptons flamingo has managed to strike up friendly relations with some longtime Lake Georgica residents – a flock of sometimes folk swans.
“He’s doing well with them,” said Lars Svanberg, a surf instructor who watched the flamingo as swans swam around him. “They all hang out together!”
Mr Lorenz, who has studied photos and videos of the flamingo in Lake Georgica, said there was no need for immediate intervention by rescue teams.
“This is a healthy bird,” he said. “It flies fine. He’s eating fine. Be quiet.”
