#Flaco

[why-animals-do-the-thing]

The Bronx Zoo has just released Flaco's necropsy results.

He was not thriving, as the people championing the ideal of "freedom" claimed.

He was poisoned.

He was sick.

He was suffering.

"Freedom" would have eventually killed him. A building just happened to do it first.

"Postmortem testing has been completed for Flaco, the Eurasian eagle owl that was found down in the courtyard of a Manhattan building a little over a year after his enclosure at the Central Park Zoo was vandalized on February 2, 2023. Onlookers reported that Flaco had flown into a building on the Upper West Side of Manhattan on February 23, 2024, and acute trauma was found at necropsy. Bronx Zoo veterinary pathologists determined that in addition to the traumatic injuries, Flaco had two significant underlying conditions. He had a severe pigeon herpesvirus from eating feral pigeons that had become part of his diet, and exposure to four different anticoagulant rodenticides that are commonly used for rat control in New York City. These factors would have been debilitating and ultimately fatal, even without a traumatic injury, and may have predisposed him to flying into or falling from the building. The identified herpesvirus can be carried by healthy pigeons but may cause fatal disease in birds of prey including owls infected by eating pigeons. This virus has been previously found in New York City pigeons and owls. In Flaco’s case, the viral infection caused severe tissue damage and inflammation in many organs, including the spleen, liver, gastrointestinal tract, bone marrow, and brain.   No other contributing factors were identified through the extensive testing that was performed. Flaco’s severe illness and death are ultimately attributed to a combination of factors—infectious disease, toxin exposures, and traumatic injuries—that underscore the hazards faced by wild birds, especially in an urban setting."

The naturalistic fallacy kills animals in horrible ways. The romanticism of what humans want to think of as a "free, wild, pure life" cannot be allowed supplant the reality of injury, sickness, and death. Releasing captive animals (or keeping them from being recaptured) because it's "better" for them to suffer untethered than live a healthy, safe, captive life is inhumane and horrific.

Flaco's life didn't have to end in pain, sickness, and suffering.

Flaco's death didn't have to be tragic.

But once the idea of "freedom" entered the chat, Flaco's fate was unavoidable.

[a-bichol]

i am obsessed with himmmmm

(studies from the bird watching twitter!)

[haltraveler]

This Flaco situation is like if, in The Martian, people started protesting the effort to save Mark Whatney because he’s free now and how dare you try to put him back in that cramped spaceship!

And NASA keeps trying to explain that Mars is not an environment where people can live but the public said “but look you said he’d be dead by now and he’s thriving!”

And then NASA tells them it’s a ridiculously astonishing feat that he survived a week, let alone months but there are so many dangerous things that can and eventually will kill him. But public outcry gets the funding for a rescue mission cut.

Then when he eventually dies from one of the hazards NASA warned about people all talk about how inspiring his life was and how at least he got to be free and happy on Mars.

[herpsandbirds]

Flaco, the Eurasian eagle-owl that escaped the central park zoo has died in apparent building collision. It is a dark day.

:C

I was really rooting for him. This is a really sad time for all of us.

RIP FLACO !!!

Flaco, the Eurasian Eagle Owl (Bubo bubo), male, family Strigidae, order Strigiformes, species found across much of Eurasia

photograph via: Manhattan Bird Alert

photograph by JACQUELINE EMERY

photograph by David Barrett 

Read more about Flaco the Owl:

Death of Flaco, NYC’s Celebrity Owl, Calls Attention to Bird Strikes - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Central Park's Flaco had a family. Conservationists fear other owls will become targets for release. - Gothamist

Flaco the owl dies after colliding with a New York building | AP News

[rodrigofut]

Seguimos 🐷🙌🏻

[osirisguzman]

Duele fingir que soy fuerte

Bueno,¿como se puede borrar 5 años de recuerdos en 4 meses?

La cicatriz que dejo alguien que me acompañó tantos años… no se irán como si nada en unos meses.

[julialundman]

“Flaco, the NYC Eagle-Owl”, 13”x13” watercolor and colored pencil on cream paper. My tribute to Flaco, who escaped his zoo enclosure and made his way over to Central Park. This painting will be on the online gallery website @everydayoriginal tomorrow, April 30th, available to purchase. Thanks for your consideration! 🩷🦉🩷

[dopescissorscashwagon]

🦉🦉🦉Flaco and the Central Park squirrel (cont). After a lengthy stare down, the squirrel decided to take the lower branch and Flaco chose to let it pass! Flaco then went back to sleep and they both lived happily ever after! 😊

📸 by Above96th

[ghostly-shenanigans-in-progress]

Bullet took that personally.

Context on who the puppies are (x)

[why-animals-do-the-thing]

Question relevant to Flaco-

It's my understanding that birds are generally able to see UV light, invisible to us. Do you think it would be feasible to create a mesh visible in UV, but not the human visible spectrum, that could be applied to windows and outer surfaces of buildings to reduce bird impacts? Not really concerned about the economic feasibility, just the functional.

This does exist!

UV stickers you can put on residential windows are pretty common these days (if you can access the outside of them - not so good for a Manhattan skyscraper).

I found a couple companies offering UV-reflective options for commercial buildings, in addition to some other visually deterrent options. Guardian BirdFirst UV is a coating, and GlasPro Bird Safe UV looks to be a patterned UV layer inserted between the exterior layers of glass windows.

None of these are totally invisible to the human eye (especially if the surface is wet, for some reason) but they're fairly easy to ignore. Normally they look like stripes or little square dots in a repeating pattern.

This is from the GlasPro site, human vision on the left, bird on the right.

It comes down to convincing people to use them: they have to believe it's important and be willing to put up with something not perfectly invisible that might be "unpleasing" or something. I also don't know how much these coatings cost, but I'd guess they're probably something only organizations that really care will want to shell out for.

[pesadillass]

Me dueles más de lo que te quise y eso flaco , eso no es amor .

[iliveinprocrasti-nationn]

ok. i’m making a more cohesive post about flaco the owl because i’m seeing a lot of people reblogging that post praising him and excited about him venturing further into nyc. as cool as it may be to see him around, i think a lot of people lack the knowledge to understand why it’s not necessarily a good thing.

as someone who’s studying wildlife and who’s been working in wildlife spaces since i was 17, i have a lot of feelings about this, but i think this article i’m going to link is more succinct and explains better the harms flaco poses/risks he faces if he remains out of captivity. i’ve been following this story since he was let out and agree with the biologists i’ve seen supporting flaco’s recapture over birders or others who support him remaining outside captivity.

i also want to clear up a misconception from the post i’ve seen going around: flaco didn’t just “escape” the zoo - it wasn’t a desperate bid for freedom or something. his enclosure was vandalised and someone purposefully let him out. that action very well could have killed him, and, considering there are still many risks, could still lead to his premature death.

[rodrigofut]

Comemoração do gol do Flaco

[osirisguzman]

EL CUARTO YA NO ESTABA CALIDO.

Y YO MAS FLACO Y MAS PÁLIDO.

[mediocrecowboyhat]

Thh I'd always be cold if I lived with Flaco d:

Me too to be honest lmao. He'd get so sick of me so fast with how often I'd wanna climb him like a tree

[emotiondelivered]