Bird of the Year 2023

By Keith Michael 

Hey y’all, thanks for bundling up and joining me here on Hudson River Park’s new Gansevoort Peninsula for the 18th Annual West Village Bird of the Year Awards 2023: The Millies! 

These awards began in 2005 at the corner of West 4th and West 12th Streets where a pink House Finch became Bird #1 of my NYC bird-counting quest. In 2012 the awards were more formalized and dubbed “The Millies” in honor of my red and white Pembroke Welsh Corgi, my birding accomplice in the West Village. Even in her absence, she has now inspired 12 years of monthly avian tales from the neighborhood with her combination of comedy and treachery underfoot. Everyone, please let out a few annoying barks in her memory!

Before we begin, a reminder of the founding criteria for The Millies: “Birds must be seen in, above, or from the five boroughs of New York. Voting is weighted toward those birds observed during Millie’s daily walks in the West Village Additional points may be lauded to those candidates actually seen by the award’s namesake. The competition in 2023 was fierce, so, “Let the fur fly!”

EXTRALIMITAL. This honor brazenly flaunts the NYC criteria because cool birds do live other places. Prime candidates among them: the Acorn Woodpecker’s comical thrift, pounding acorns into holes to stockpile for later; a Hooded Oriole exemplifying its name, or the impossibly looooong-billed Long-billed Curlew. Closer to home, competing votes went out to the flashy pink Roseate Spoonbill that graced a pond on Long Island, and to the winner: a congenial, chatty bird of the Adirondacks, the Canada Jay.

NOT A BIRD. There were lots of seals, whales, and dolphins this year. In fact, seeing a pair of Sperm Whales 100 miles out in the Atlantic Ocean was a highlight. But I’m really going to push the boundary of this category to a three-way tie for NEW PLACES TO BIRD IN NYC: Gansevoort Peninsula; Arverne East Nature Preserve, Rockaway, Queens; and Freshkills North Park, Staten Island. These are three new places to go that didn’t exist in 2022!

OWL OF THE YEAR. ANY owl deserves this prize just for being an owl, but the threat of Millie’s disapproving side-eye, even from the great beyond, will keep me honest to pick just one. That ONE will have to be one of an adorable pair of Great Horned Owl fledglings from a park in Queens. 

BEST DRESSED (I’M PRETTY AND I KNOW IT). The judges debated this one behind closed doors but, short of tossing a coin, the only resolution was to create two awards honoring two dapper Staten Island designer dudes. The SPRING COLLECTION centerfold spread goes to a fastidious Great Egret in his nuptial whites while the FALL COLLECTION runway walk is led by an equally flirty Wild Turkey in his sartorially extravagant, super-puff ensemble.

FLOCKING BEHAVIOR. Though multiples of ducks, geese, cormorants, shorebirds, gulls, terns, blackbirds, and starlings all vied for attention, this “the most-est of many” citation belongs to an ethereal group of Bonaparte’s Gulls rising from Coney Island’s beach.

DOUBLE THE PLEASURE. Seeing a bonded pair of birds together is far from easy. After waiting more than a decade for this sighting, after dozens of visits, the wings-down winners of this category were the Staten Island Bald Eagle royal pair, Vito and Linda, surveying their domain from the cross of the Mount Loretto Church.

BEST PARENTING. When tens of thousands of birds raise families in NYC, how to pick just one lucky couple? Well, this year the award must go to the endangered Fort Tilden Piping Plover pair: “Clark Kent” and his mate. After five summers returning to this singular Queens beach after wintering in the Bahamas, at long last, this summer they finally raised ONE chick that survived.

FEMALE BIRD OF THE YEAR. The flashy male birds are photographed more often but, don’t forget, male birds find the females stunning to behold, so we should too! The winner this year is a sassy damsel Long-tailed Duck, tossing the Atlantic Ocean over her shoulder as she dives out of the waves.

CUTEST BIRD OF THE YEAR. Needless to say, the cuteness factor in many birds is part of their ineffable charm. The judges consigned to give the cute Piping Plover chicks a year off, though the apparent doe-eyed innocence of a visiting Buff-breasted Plover at Fort Tilden was a worthy contender. But even Millie might have approved of the winning Field Sparrow spotted right on a fence on the Gansevoort Peninsula because of its corgi-ish red and white coloring and simpatico wide-eyed-ness.

MILLIE’S WEST VILLAGE NEW BIRD OF THE YEAR. Remarkably, there were four new West Village birds in 2023: an Osprey in August, a Marsh Wren in October, a Rusty Blackbird in November, and an Ash-throated Flycatcher in December. The judges voted to give the west-of-the-Mississippi native Ash-throated Flycatcher (My West Village Bird #114) hanging out at Bank and Hudson Streets this prized acknowledgement.

NEW BIRD OF THE YEAR. 2023 brought four birds new to me right in NYC: Western Meadowlark, Anhinga, Sandwich Tern, and Black-chinned Hummingbird. Since I worked the hardest for one of them, four trips out to the Brooklyn Bush Terminal Piers Park, not an insignificant schlep, and because it’s a super-pretty yellow bird, this honor is bestowed upon the Western Meadowlark.

BIRD OF THE YEAR 2023. The 2023 Bird of the Year…HAS to be Flaco, the escaped Eurasian Eagle Owl. During the night of February 2, Flaco’s enclosure at the Central Park Zoo, where he lived for 12 years, was vandalized, and Flaco made his way into the wide, wild world. Initially, there was 24-hour surveillance to attempt his recapture, but soon he was hunting successfully on his own—the new Rat Czar. After his stint behind bars, his comfortability being watched by people made him an instant paparazzi celebrity. Hundreds of people followed his day-to-day whereabouts in Central Park. For months, the North Woods became his domain, but after ten months, recent forays have taken him to the East Village and Flaco has also regularly been sighted/heard on the Upper West Side, hooting from the tops of landmark buildings.

That’s a wrap. 2023 was an exceptional year for birding in New York City. May 2024 bring many new birds safely to our West Village. Millie thanks you for attending.

Visit keithmichaelnyc.com or follow @newyorkcitywild on Instagram.