Factory, Flamingos Go on Strike

In a bizarre ecological twist, flamingos in a French lagoon were imperiled by a nearby salt factory—not by the saline runoff when the factory was operating, but the lack of runoff when it stopped. It seems that workers went on strike, the saltworks closed, and the wetlands dried up. So the flamingos went on strike too: the whole flock failed to breed, the Independent reports.

This result—10,000 flamingos and nary a chick—embarrassed the national government.   So shortly after the recent French election, a new contract was ironed out, detailing continued but reduced salt extraction, with restored runoff into the Camargue wetlands. Time will tell if the compromise flies with the flamingos. (More flamingos stories.)