Two male flamingos have joined their kind’s ranks of same-sex co-parents after hatching an egg together at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park.

The two foster dads are both in their 40s and are lesser flamingos, a species found in sub-Saharan Africa and western India, according to the zoo. The chick is also a lesser flamingo.

They were given a fake egg to sit on earlier this year – and after passing the test, they were given a real egg, which they hatched successfully.

“The pair has perfected their fatherly duties by alternating brooding responsibilities”, the zoo wrote in a social media post.

A two-dad flamingo family is not unprecedented. Earlier this year, two male flamingos at a UK zoo, Curtis and Arthur, successfully hatched a chick.

The San Diego foster parent flamingos feed their chick crop “milk” from their upper digestive tract. “Both males and females can feed the chick this way, and even flamingos that are not the parents can act as foster-feeders,” the zoo said.

The public occasionally becomes fascinated with stories of relatively uncommon bird hatchings.

An eagle at a Missouri bird sanctuary went viral after he tried to hatch a rock.

In 2017, two male griffon vultures successfully hatched an abandoned egg at Artis Amsterdam Royal Zoo.

Two years ago, a same-sex male Humboldt penguin couple at a New York state zoo hatched an egg, which had been glued together after the breeding pair, Poquita and Vente, cracked it and gave it to the male penguins. The male penguins, Elmer and Lima, had also been given a dummy egg to practice sitting on before they hatched their real one.

“It takes practice,” said zoo director Ted Fox, noting that some couples’ fight for who is going to sit on it and when. “That’s how we evaluate who will be good foster parents – and Elmer and Lima were exemplary in every aspect of egg care.”

The New York Mets and Atlanta traded celebrations on the same Truist Field on Monday, when the wild National League wild card race was finally decided.

The NL needed an extra day and two postponed games to settle things, but when Atlanta beat the Mets 3-0 to salvage a split in a doubleheader pushed back because of Hurricane Helene, Arizona was left out.

All three finished the regular season at 89-73, but the Diamondbacks lost a tiebreaker after losing season series to Atlanta (5-2) and the Mets (4-3).

“We’re in, and anything can happen,” manager Brian Snitker said after Atlanta secured a playoff berth for the seventh straight season.

The Diamondbacks can lament the final eight days of the season — they lost an 8-0 lead in a 10-9 loss at Milwaukee on Sept. 22 and lost home series to San Francisco and San Diego in the last week.

The Mets won 19 of their final 28 games, the best record in the majors, to reach the playoffs for the second time since 2016. Atlanta was 16-12 in that stretch and the Diamondbacks were 13-15. The Mets were 11 games under .500 open June 2.

Milwaukee and San Diego not only will have the home field field advantage, they will have the freshness edge after the Mets and Atlanta played 18 innings Monday.

No. 6 seed New York Mets (89-73) vs No. 3 seed Milwaukee (93-69)

Tuesday: New York Mets (Luis Severino, 11-7, 3.91 ERA) at Milwaukee (Freddy Peralta, 11-9, 3.68), ESPN, 4:30 pm ET

Wednesday: New York Mets at Milwaukee, ESPN, 6:30 pm ET

Thursday: New York Mets at Milwaukee ESPN2, 7:30 pm ET (if necessary)

Season series: Milwaukee, 5-1. The Brewers opened the season with a three-game sweep in New York and closed the season by winning two of three. The Mets’ victory Sunday opened their window a little wider.

Players to watch/things to know

New York Mets: SS Francisco Lindor gave Shohei Ohtani a run for the NL MVP award with 33 homers, 91 RBIs and 29 stolen bases. He pushed the Mets into the playoffs with a two-run homer in the ninth inning of the 7-6 victory in the first game at Atlanta on Monday.

1B Pete Alonso had 34 homers and 88 RBIs in his walk year, and RF Brandon Nimmo had 90 RBIs and 23 homers, including big ones in the final week stretch against Philadelphia and Atlanta.

The Mets had four double-digit winners, led by lefty Sean Manaea, who tied his career high with 12 wins and had a carer-best 3.47 ERA after signing a two-year, $28 million deal last winter that includes a player option.

Milwaukee: SS Willy Adames set career highs in almost every offensive category — 32 homers, 112 RBIs, 33 doubles, 21 stolen bases — as he prepares to hit the free agent market this winter. 1B Rhys Hoskins has 26 homers and 82 RBIs in his first (and maybe only season) here.

Rookie Jackson Chourio made a late run at the Rookie of the Year award, finishing with 21 homers, 22 stolen bases and 79 RBIs. Chourio, who signed an eight-year, $82 million deal at the winter meetings, is the only player in major league history with a 20/20/20 three peat — 20 homers and stolen bases at age 20.

The Brewers made the playoffs for sixth time in seven seasons under first-year manager Pat Murphy. He used 17 starting pitches, only three of whom make more than 14 starts. They have 64 defensive runs “saved,” according to Fangraphs, tied with the Los Angeles Dodgers for the most in the league, and have 217 stolen bases.

No. 5 seed Atlanta (89-73) vs No. 4 seed San Diego (93-69)

Tuesday: Atlanta (TBA) at San Diego (Michael King, 13-9, 2.95), ESPN, 7:30 pm ET

Wednesday: Atlanta at San Diego ESPN2, 7:30 pm ET

Thursday: Atlanta at San Diego, ESPN, 6 pm ET (if necessary)

Season series: San Diego won, 4-3. The Padres won three of four in Atlanta but lost two of three at home before the All-Star break. Chris Sale won both his starts agains the Padres, giving up one run in 12 innings.

Players to watch/things to know

Atlanta: Sale is the overwhelming favorite to win the NL Cy Young Award after going 18-3 with a league-leading 2.38 ERA in his first season in Atlanta, but his health is a major issue entering the playoffs.

Sale was scratched from his scheduled start in the second game of the Monday doubleheader against the Mets because of back spasms, and manager Snitker said he is unlikely to pitch against the Padres, a huge blow even for a team whose starters led the NL with a 3.56 ERA.

DH Marcell Ozuna (39 homers, 104 RBIs) and 1B Matt Olson (29/98) were two of the only three players with least 450 at-bats for the injury-ravaged Braves. RF Ronald Acuna, the 2023 NL MVP, has been out with a knee injury since May and 3B Austin Riley (19 homers) will miss the postseason with a broken hand suffered Aug. 18.

San Diego: 3B Manny Machado (29 homers), LF Jurickson Profar (24), CF Jackson Merrill (24) and RF Fernando Tatis Jr. (21) lead a balanced offense that got a bump when DH/IF Luis Arraez (.318) was acquired from Miami to fill the leadoff hole May 4. Arraez won his third batting title in three seasons.

Offseason acquisitions RHPs Dylan Cease and King anchor a solid rotation, and RHP Roberto Suarez had a career-high 36 saves in his first season as a closer. Merrill is a top candidate for NL Rookie of the Year, adding 90 RBIs.

The Padres are 43-19 since July 19, the best record in the majors over that span by three games. The Dodgers held them off in the division by going 41-23 in that same stretch. San Diego does a lot well. They lead the NL in batting average (263), are fifth in ERA (3.86), tied for first in shutouts (16) and fourth in fielding percentage.

Aaron Barrett is lucky to be alive.

“I overdosed seven times,” Barrett said. “Twice, I was flatlined. No heart rate, no breathing, no pulse. And they were able to bring me back.”

Barrett spent decades addicted to drugs and alcohol, and for the last seven years of his addiction, homeless on the streets of San Diego.

“There’s a lot of despair and hopelessness amongst the homeless community. Every little bit they have, it’s so easily taken away,” Barrett said. “There were times where, you know, I slept out in the cold. I’ve eaten out of trash cans. I’ve gone and picked up recycling just to get some money, you know, to do whatever — either get high or maybe get a little bite to eat, maybe not. And that’s how it is for most people. That’s how they live every single day. They wake up cold and hungry, and usually they go to sleep cold and hungry.”

When Barrett overdosed the last time in 2021, his wife found him on the riverbed and took him to the hospital.

“That’s when they told me I had a fever of 103, I had already gone septic and I had enough fentanyl in me to kill 30 people,” Barrett said, “and that if she wouldn’t have made it there within the hour or two that she did, there would have been nothing they could have done to save me.”

That was the moment Barrett said he began to turn his life around.

For years, he had been attending dinners hosted every Tuesday night by We See You San Diego, a nonprofit organization that invites anyone experiencing homelessness for a home-cooked meal each week.

“We host these dinner parties. We call them lavish dinner parties to show lavish love, to show people we believe they’re worthy of a better life,” said Laura Chez, We See You San Diego’s executive director.

Chez, her husband and another couple began serving meals in 2017.

They began with just a handful of guests, but seven years later, they serve more than 100 people each week, providing dinner, clothing, hygiene products and more.

It also comes with an invitation for those battling addiction: We See You San Diego will pay for detox and residential recovery for anyone who wants it.

“We walk alongside people all the way through to sober living and help them plan next steps so that they can reintegrate and live healthy, wonderful, beautiful lives with limitless potential,” Chez said.

Barrett accepted the invitation three years ago. He’s still at every Tuesday dinner – but now, serving guests, some he remembers from his days living at the riverbed.

“For a long time, I was lost. I didn’t have a purpose. You know, I was just trying to fill this hole inside that couldn’t be filled, this emptiness,” Barrett said. “And I found my purpose. My purpose is to help others pull them out from where I was.”

Chez said they’ve walked 107 people through recovery since January 2023.

“We see this over and over, that there are plans and purposes that people have not yet stepped into, but they needed an assist, and they also don’t want to do it alone,” she said. “There’s so much fear, and so we’re there to help mitigate that fear. We tell them, ‘We’re never going to leave you.’”

We See You San Diego’s work caught the attention of the Lucky Duck Foundation, a privately funded group that looks for immediate solutions to the homelessness crisis.

“Not one kid ever raised their hand and said, ‘When I grow up, I want to be homeless. I want to live on the streets,’” said Lucky Duck CEO Drew Moser.

“There’s far too many people suffering on the streets,” Moser continued. “Sometimes government can get tunnel vision on ‘We need more housing,’ and I think a lot of people can agree housing is an ideal outcome, but if all we do is focus on housing, we say that’s kind of like telling passengers on a sinking ship, ‘Hang on, we’ll build you some lifeboats sometime in the next five to 10 years,’ because that’s how long it takes to add housing, unfortunately, and it’s really challenging to scale economically. We’re focused on the here and the now.”

In September, the Lucky Duck Foundation – long backed by late Padres owner Peter Seidler and basketball legend Bill Walton – awarded We See You San Diego its annual “Fr. Joe Hustler of the Year Award” in honor of Fr. Joe Carroll.

That award comes with $250,000 to help We See You San Diego expand. It’s part of Lucky Duck’s newly unveiled $3 million commitment to several initiatives aimed at combatting homelessness.

But the award comes with a challenge: it’s contingent on a match from local governments, like San Diego County or any of its 18 cities.

“We’re encouraging government to do its part to help expand a program that’s proven, that’s tangible, that’s immediate, that has a lot of value and that’s saved a lot of lives,” Moser said. “The bang for the buck is significant, especially compared to some of the existing strategies that they’re employing.”

On Sept. 26, Lucky Duck sent a letter to the San Diego County Board of Supervisors outlining the ask and noting that there are only 78 detox beds in the entire county that accept Medi-Cal. The county board said it received the letter and was in the process of reviewing the request.

Chez said the funding could make a world of difference.

“The only thing I see is faces. I see the faces whose lives could be transformed with that money,” Chez said. 

Her message to local government is simple. 

“Let’s save lives together,” Chez said. “It would be an honor.”