Storks nest in small colonies. Always high up and exposed, the nest is built at the top of a tree, on a pylon, a roof or a chimney. The male arrives at the nesting site before the female, consolidating and enlarging an existing nest that can reach 2 metres in diameter and weigh over 500 kg! When the female joins him, she makes the centre of the nest more comfortable with leaves and grass. Incubation begins as soon as the first egg is laid, so the hatchlings are born at different times. Both parents feed the young by regurgitating worms and insects into the bottom of the nest. Growth is rapid: at 10 weeks, the young storks begin to fly and gradually leave the nest. They join their elders to make their first migration south together. Most of them stay there for a year before returning to their nesting sites.

For the stork, a remarkable glider, the shortest route is not necessarily a straight line! Indeed, above the Mediterranean, there are no warm updrafts, so the migration routes between Europe and Africa pass either through Spain or Turkey.

Upon their return from Africa, pollution, pesticides that poison the small rodents they feed on, the reduction of wetlands and, above all, the increase in power lines on which they injure themselves, put storks at risk in industrialised countries. Measures are being studied to limit the number of these accidents (scarecrows, ultrasound, etc.) and, in France, conservation and reintroduction programmes have narrowly saved the species: from around ten breeding pairs in 1974, there are now around 1,900, mainly in Alsace and Charente Maritime.

For the stork, a remarkable glider, the shortest route is not necessarily a straight line! Indeed, above the Mediterranean, there are no warm updrafts, so the migration routes between Europe and Africa pass either through Spain or Turkey.

Upon their return from Africa, pollution, pesticides that poison the small rodents they feed on, the reduction of wetlands and, above all, the increase in power lines on which they injure themselves, put storks at risk in industrialised countries. Measures are being studied to limit the number of these accidents (scarecrows, ultrasound, etc.) and, in France, conservation and reintroduction programmes have narrowly saved the species: from around ten breeding pairs in 1974, there are now around 1,900, mainly in Alsace and Charente Maritime.

The stork, symbol of Alsace, occupies a special place in the popular tradition of many countries: the main character in numerous fables, bringing a swaddled baby in its beak or protecting the house that shelters it from lightning.