NZ Bird of the Year… is not a bird

Last year, this beloved and keenly followed competition was rocked by voting fraud.  This year, there was dismay in some quarters after the organisers included a native mammal- a bat- as a candidate.  Well, this morning it was announced that the bat had won the stakes.  To quote from a report in The Guardian:

In a huge upset to New Zealand birds, but a win for one of the country’s only native land mammals, a bat has swooped in “by a long way” to take out the annual bird of the year competition.

Forest and Bird, which runs the election, thew the bat among the pigeons as a surprise entry this year. The pekapeka-tou-roa, or long tailed bat, is one of two bats in the country and one of the rarest mammals in the world. It is as small as a thumb, and the size of a bumblebee when it is born.


One Twitter user summed up the situation thus: