In the winter of 1890, a snowy owl was spotted in New York’s Central Park, part of what a contemporary account called “unusual abundance” along the east coast of the great and beautiful predators that live in the Arctic tundra.
“Uncommon” is right. A snow owl, according to birdwatching records, hasn’t been fluffy in Central Park for another 130 years.
Then came Wednesday morning.
A birder who manages the Twitter account Manhattan Bird Alert read about an owl sighting on a tracking website and sounded the alarm.
“SNOWY OWL, a mega-rarity for Central Park,” he wrote, “is now in the middle of the North Meadow ball fields.” The cluster of baseball and softball diamonds may have reminded the owl of its native hunting grounds or the beaches of Queens and Long Island, where owls tend to spend winter.
The hordes came running, cameras and spyglasses in hand, and the snow-white raptor with the thick black bars that mark a young female was the last instant celebrity bird in Manhattan – a sequence of both Rocky the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree owl last year and the superstar mandarin duck that ruled the park and the world’s social media feeds in 2018.
There was the owl, sitting on a wire fence: CLICK. Arriving to land near the third base: CLICK.
Looking flirtatiously over her shoulder: CLICK, CLICK.
Doing that incredible 180 degree thing that owls can do with their heads: CLICK, CLICK, CLICK.
“I am thrilled to share the excitement with other bird watchers !!” the user boysenberry45 wrote on Twitter. The crowd itself began to attract a crowd: Supporters of Andrew Yang’s candidacy for mayor appeared with campaign posters.
The owl also caught the attention of the park’s avian residents.
A bunch of crows flew down to harass her and try to expel her (owls sometimes eat crows).
AN Red-tailed hawk buzz over her head (hawks are fiercely territorial and do not tolerate invaders).
Baseball fields are fenced in the winter to allow the grass to grow again, so the crushing viewers it was kept a few hundred meters away from the owl, but that didn’t stop at least one person from cheating.
“We had to correct a condition of the drone,” said Dan Tainow, park department ranger.
“Someone was trying to take that aerial shot,” he said from about 15 meters high. “The owl was aware of that. It was stressful. “
Some enthusiasts have criticized the Manhattan Bird Alert for revealing the bird’s exact whereabouts to 38,000 followers. “Tweeting the location of a snow owl to a fan base with a long history of harassing owls is a great look, man,” a user called Aidan Place wrote.
But the observer behind the Manhattan Bird Alert, David Barrett, a retired hedge fund manager who started the account in 2013, said he was providing a public service and building support for conservation efforts.
“If you want people to care about nature,” he said, “you must show them that it is there and let them appreciate it for themselves.”
Thursday morning, there was no snow in Central Park anywhere.
“I’m not surprised it has changed,” said Paul Sweet, manager of the American Museum of Natural History’s ornithology collection. “I was not being left alone – I was being very uncomfortable.” (He was referring to other birds, not people.)
But if you want to see a white owl in the vicinity of the park, you still can. It is in the museum itself, at the first floor roundabout, shining from its small pedestal. A teenage Teddy Roosevelt filmed him on Long Island in 1876.
In fact, the museum has more than 200 snowy owls stuffed, cataloged and kept in metal drawers. Mr. Sweet can look at them whenever he wants, but that didn’t stop him from going to the park at lunchtime on Wednesday to see one live.
“I couldn’t lose,” he said. “There were about a hundred people looking at him.”