A raptor with no qualms about eating its opponents wins New Zealand’s annual bird election

WELLINGTON, New Zealand: New Zealand ’s annual bird election is contested by cheeky parrots, sweet songbirds and cute, puffball robins. This year’s winner was a mysterious falcon that wouldn’t think twice about eating them.

Kārearea, the Indigenous Māori name for the New Zealand falcon, was crowned Bird of the Year on Monday. But the annual poll, run by conservation group Forest & Bird, is no ordinary online vote.The fiercely fought election sees volunteer (human) campaign managers apply to stump for their favorite bird. Feathers fly as avian enthusiasts seek to sway the public through meme battles, trash-talking poster campaigns and dance routines performed in bird costumes.The contest draws attention to New Zealand’s native bird species, with 80% designated as being in trouble to some degree. But it attracts passionate fandom because New Zealanders are bird-obsessed.The first contest two decades ago attracted fewer than 900 votes. More than 75,000 people in the country of 5 million cast ballots this year.The majestic kārearea can fly at speeds of more than 200 km (124 miles) per hour and swoops to capture its prey, often smaller birds. The endemic species is threatened in New Zealand, vulnerable to electrocution on wires and loss of their forest habitats.They’re a mysterious bird and that’s partly because they’re cryptic, they’re often well-hidden,” said Phil Bradfield, a trustee of Kārearea Falcon Trust in Marlborough, on New Zealand’s South Island.Despite the near-record voter turnout, Toki from Forest & Bird said she feared New Zealanders would give up on some of the most threatened species as they grew more costly to protect, particularly from predators such as cats, rats and stoats.

“Successive governments in New Zealand have cumulatively reduced investment in conservation, which is the cornerstone of New Zealand’s economic prosperity,” she said, referring to tourism campaigns promoting the country’s scenic landscapes.

Official figures suggest between 5,000 and 8,000 New Zealand falcons remaining, although the true number is unknown. Bradfield said the “fast and sneaky and very special” raptor was a deserving Bird of the Year winner.

It was the highest-ever voter turnout apart from an episode when Last Week Tonight host John Oliver volunteered as a campaign manager in 2023, prompting mostly joking accusations from New Zealanders of American interference. Perhaps inevitably, Oliver’s bird, the pūteketeke or Australasian crested grebe, won in a 290,000-vote landslide.

In a country with no native land mammals except for two species of bat, birds reign supreme. They appear in art, on jewelry, in schoolchildren’s songs, and in the name New Zealanders are known by abroad, “kiwis.”

“Bird of the Year has grown from a simple email poll in 2005 to a hotly contested cultural moment,” said Forest & Bird Chief Executive Nicola Toki. “Behind the memes and mayhem is a serious