Wichita ? A flamingo that escaped from the Sedgwick County Zoo has turned up 600 miles away at a national wildlife refuge on the Texas coast and apparently has found a friend.

The pale pink bird was one of two flamingos that fled the Kansas zoo in July 2005.

“He’s found a wild Caribbean flamingo friend that is originally from Mexico but probably came up during the hurricanes,” said zoo spokeswoman Christan Baumer, referring to Hurricanes Katrina and Rita.

Biologists who spotted the new bird at the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge on Texas’ Gulf Coast identified it by its leg band, and zoo officials confirmed it as one of their missing flamingos.

The escapee does not have a name; it is identified only by number, Baumer said.

The zoo has decided to leave the flamingo in Texas for now.

“Anything we do down there might be very disruptive to the waterfowl already down there,” said the zoo’s curator of birds, Joe Barkowski. Barkowski said flamingos, which can stand 4 to 5 feet tall and weigh 4 to 8 pounds, are very hearty birds.

Zoo flamingos’ feathers are clipped to keep the birds grounded, but last summer the zoo apparently missed clipping the feathers of the two that got away. When a big gust of wind came along, Baumer said, the birds discovered their feathers were long enough to fly.

About half of the zoo’s 75 flamingos came from Africa in 2003. They were wild and accustomed to flying, so it’s not surprising they would take off on their own, Barkowski said.

“The 600-mile journey it took to get to Aransas is kind of surprising,” he said. “We’re not seeing migrations of that distance a lot.”

Zoo officials said they still haven’t heard what happened to the other flamingo that escaped, but they’re hoping it’s still be out there somewhere.