Will it be a mighty seabird, a forest-dwelling songster, or perhaps one of our flightless friends? 

Voting for Forest & Bird’s Te Manu Rongonui o te Tau takes flight next week, seeking a new champ for the coveted Bird of the Year title for 2024. 

With no controversial kick-outs (yes, the kākāpō is in) nor any foreign election interference on the cards – at least, nothing we know of – this year’s competition is anybird’s to win. 

Voting opens at 9am on Monday 2 September and runs for two weeks, closing at 5pm on Sunday 15 September. The winner will be announced on the morning of Monday 16 September.  

Votes can be cast on the Bird of the Year website 

Share your why – for the love of birds 

The campaign calls on Kiwis (the human kind) to vote for their top five birds and share their ‘why’. 

Last year, we asked voters to tell us the reasons behind their pick for top bird. We received thousands of responses – from heartwarming, to humorous, to frankly unprintable. 

Read more about what voters told us 

This year, we’re drawing on this treasure trove to highlight just how much New Zealanders feel connected to our weird and wonderful native birds – more than 80% of which are ‘At risk’ or ‘Threatened’ with extinction. 

Feathery feuds ignite 

Around sixty volunteer campaign managers have signed up to advocate for their fave feathered friend, across 74 avian candidates in total. 

New on the ballot this year is the Adélie penguin, backed by Antarctica New Zealand. While these dapper flappers are only rare visitors to Aotearoa’s mainland, more than one-third of the global Adélie population lives in the Ross Sea Region, New Zealand’s home in Antarctica. 

“These penguins not only wear the most adorable tuxedos but are also invaluable science ambassadors,” says Annie Robertson from Antarctica New Zealand. “They can tell us so much about our climate, and the Antarctic ecosystem.” 

The Adélie penguin will have tough competition from 2019 champ hoiho (yellow-eyed penguin), who is backed by a consortium of Dunedin organisations.  

Bringing their cutting-edge meme expertise to the competition, students from Victoria University of Wellington are already engaging in fierce birdy banter on social media, with Salient magazine backing the kororā, and the president of the students’ association pledging to get a black robin tattoo.  

For Jaimee Maha, takahē campaign manager, her ‘why’ is tied to family legacy. Maha’s grandad, Ted Bennett, was good mates with Doc Orbell, leader of the crew who famously rediscovered the takahē in 1948.

While Bennett wasn’t on that original team, he went on many adventures with Orbell to restore takahē habitat in the Murchison Mountains.

“I often think about how stoked they would be to see how the population has grown,” says Maha. 

Libby Manning, campaigning for the tarāpunga red-billed gull, wants voters to see past the gulls’ reputation as chippy thieves.

“Yeah, they’re loud and sassy, but, man, life would be so much more boring without them! I want more New Zealanders to appreciate their existence.” 

See all the campaigns on the Bird of the Year website