Flaco is free, but the state of the city for birds is mixed

Good morning. It is Friday. We will learn about a rodent that lives in a zoo and a bird that also lived in it – until it fled to the wilds of Manhattan. We also get details about the settlement negotiations for the former chief financial officer of Donald Trump's family business.

It's Groundhog Day. There's a chance of rain, so when it comes to shadow vision, the Staten Island Zoo's groundhog Chuck might be staring at wet, squishy ground as he waddles out of his den.

Let's focus on another creature: one that escaped captivity a year ago and is still roaming free in Manhattan. Namely Flaco, the Eurasian eagle owl.

Flaco caught the city's attention. But he is only one bird. Of the 800 bird species in North America, more than 300 call New York home sometime during the year. What's with them?

“Some things go really well, some don't,” said Dustin Partridge, director of conservation and science at Audubon in New York City, when I asked how he would start a State of the City address for birds.

Those weren't exactly “the state of our city is strong,” words Mayor Eric Adams used in his State of the City address last week.

What is good

“Birding is a moment,” Partridge said. “It's a great time.”

This is partly due to the interest Flaco is generating, he said. For New Yorkers whose ideas about birds ranged from pigeons to sparrows, Flaco was a consciousness-raiser. And like Freya McGregor, noted a birdwatcher who founded the nonprofit Birdability“There is no certification required to be a bird watcher, and no one will check your credentials to make sure you are 'qualified'.”

But Flaco came a little late to the bird population. In 2018, the Mandarin Duck mesmerized New Yorkers during its stay at the Central Park Pond. Then bird clubs and conservation groups boomed during the pandemic, as city dwellers cooped up in apartments turned to parks and activities they could do there, Partridge said. “People were noticing birds, and some were noticing them for the first time,” he said.

Central Park, where Flaco lived for a while, has been a favorite birdwatching spot since its beginnings in the mid-1800s. On a good day during spring migration, bird watchers can see as many as 100 species, Partridge said.

What's not good: Winters in the north

Migratory bird populations are declining. Brooke Bateman, director of climate science for the National Audubon Society, said short- and medium-range species that used to move south are wintering further north. As she put it: “They say, 'Why should I migrate south? Things are going well here.'”

She said that during the Audubon Society's annual Christmas Bird Count — a 23-day event that runs from mid-December to early January — she heard of a sighting of 35 American oystercatchers, which have long orange bills and feast on oysters, clams and little else. “Usually it's just a few,” she said. But conditions were so mild that such birds “stick around.”

That includes the species of warblers that “should be gone” in time for the Christmas bird count, she said. Instead, “they're hanging in here because the conditions indicate it's mild,” she said, “but if we get hit by a cold snap, it's very difficult for them to survive.”

The danger of buildings

New York is a stopover for birds migrating on the so-called Atlantic Flyway, which is managed by the American Bird Conservancy describes as an “avian superhighway” that runs from Greenland to Florida.

As far as layovers go, New York isn't the safest. It has glass-heavy buildings that birds can hit.

Partridge said collisions kill as many as 250,000 migratory birds in New York City each year. One of the most common victims of collisions is the white-throated sparrow, a plaintive-sounding songbird, according to data from Safe Flight Projecta New York City-based Audubon program that tracks deaths from birds crashing into windows across the city.

“We only find a small fraction of birds that hit the glass and die immediately,” Partridge said. “A large number hit the glass, fly away and die somewhere in the vegetation.”

Partridge said most collisions occur in the bottom 100 feet of buildings, about the height of the tree canopy in nearby parks. The typical victim, he said, is “a bird that flies in from far away, lands in the morning and needs a place to roost and roost after a meal of insects and seeds.”

“He sees a reflection, flies into it and thinks this is a safe place to rest – and ends up dying,” he said.

There is hope among birdwatchers that the number of collisions will decrease. The city now needs new buildings and major window replacement projects to meet what the Building Department calls “bird-friendly design construction requirements” – essentially glass that birds will recognize and avoid. The Buildings Department detailed the rules in a 23-page document.

As for making existing windows bird-friendly, Audubon in New York City suggests small dot-shaped stickers. Partridge said they can reduce collisions by as much as 90 percent.

Weather

Prepare for a chance of rain at first and then a partly sunny day, with temperatures in the low 40s. At night it will be partly cloudy, with temperatures around 30 degrees.

ALTERNATE PARKING

In effect until February 9 (New Year's Eve).

Allen Weisselberg, the former chief financial officer of Donald Trump's family business, is negotiating a deal to plead guilty to perjury, people with knowledge of the matter said. Under the possible agreement with the Manhattan district attorney's office, Weisselberg would admit to lying on the witness stand in Trump's recent civil fraud trial.

Weisselberg is also expected to say he lied under oath during an interview with the attorney general's office, which brought the case against Trump.

The situation stems from the web of cases brought by prosecutors from the two agencies. A plea deal would serve as the culmination of a long-term pressure campaign by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg. His prosecutors had sought Weisselberg's cooperation as they investigated whether Trump had committed electoral and financial crimes.

Weisselberg — a fiercely loyal lieutenant who oversaw the Trump Organization's finances for decades — was uncooperative. But prosecutors secured charges against Trump in the election-related case anyway.

The deal being negotiated would likely not require Weisselberg to turn on his former boss, even if he was involved in the action at the center of that case — a $130,000 hush-money payment intended to cover up a possible sex scandal just before the to suppress the 2016 elections. It is expected that he will not be called as a witness during the trial, which is scheduled for the end of March.

And the investigation that most needed Weisselberg's help, the district attorney's probe into Trump's finances, may no longer be a priority for prosecutors.

The possible deal with Weisselberg could strengthen Bragg's position when the trial begins next month by discouraging other witnesses in Trump's inner circle from taking the stand. Allegations of perjury could also discredit Weisselberg, who has disputed details of the prosecution's evidence in the case surrounding the 2016 election.

But Weisselberg already had a credibility problem: This would be his second guilty plea in Manhattan in two years.

METROPOLITAN diary

Sheep pasture

Dear Diary:

One day
I saw him cutting a purple lilac
Straight from a bush
At Sheep Meadow
At the end of a spring rain,
In the 60s
When the grass was still green,
And maybe he worked there,
Or was just a tourist
Who pulled a small red vase
Out of his jacket,
So I asked him what it was for,
But he just smiled,
An old man who said nothing,
He must have known
That's the contrast
Of purple lilacs
And red glass
It sounded like music
In Central Park

– Kathryn Anne Sweeney-James