Prehistoric Flamingo Nest, Eggs Discovered In Spain

A fossil’s bird nest has been discovered in limestone block in the Ebro Basin in northeastern Spain holding 5 eggs. After research scientist believes that this nest and eggs belongs to an ancient flamingo some 18 million years ago.

Scientist believes that this nest was left alone and sunk into a not too much deep salty lake before being covered in mud and fossilizing during the early Miocene.

After the scanning of eggshell fragments in laboratory some microscopic features resembling with the modern age flamingo's eggs were revealed however the type of nest is different from today’s flamingo's nest as modern flamingos make muddy volcano-shaped nests with a single, large egg in each, but this ancient nest was made from  flamingo’s wings and leaves and holds several eggs. The researchers said that the nest actually looks more like those of modern grebes, diving birds that build floating platform nests, which typically hold three to eight eggs and are anchored to the bottom of a lake with aquatic plants.

This new fossil then might indicate that the grebe-style nest is ancestral to this group of birds and that, over time, modern flamingos diverged, developing their volcano-shaped nests.