Which New Zealand bird is your favourite? Have you seen this bird in its natural habitat? It you haven’t yet, it will probably be on your lifer list.

It’s that time of year when we can all vote for our favourite bird and decide which will be the NZ Bird of the Year for 2017. Voting closes on 23 October 2017.  Learn more about each bird and listen to their call.

There are 54 birds to chose from and some of these are listed as “In serious trouble”. The worst thing for these birds would be if next year the listing shows “extinct”. I hope that those listed as ‘in serious trouble’ can be helped to move their status to ‘in some trouble’ and then to ‘doing ok’. It would be a wonderful improvement if all native birds could increase in number and have the right environment for the species to flourish.

Each year I vote for a different bird and this year my vote has gone to the NZ falcon, kārearea. I learnt about and watched these amazing birds at Wingspan, The NZ Bird of Prey Centre earlier in the year. I am convinced that they deserve to keep their place in the NZ ecosystem.