Did you know that Singapore has a national bird?
Everyone knows Singapore’s national flower is the Orchid, but do you know that Singapore’s national bird is the Crimson Sunbird?
The Crimson Sunbird, or Aethopyga siparaja, was declared the national bird by Dr Shawn Lum, President of the Nature Society (Singapore) at the 6th Asian Bird Fair Fellowship Dinner on 31st October 2015.
The national bird was apparently chosen in a public vote at the society’s 1st Nature Day way back in 2002. In that poll, the Crimson Sunbird won with 400 votes, or 38 per cent of a total of 1038 votes. Yahoo Singapore has reached out to the Nature Society (Singapore) regarding the 13 year gap between the vote and announcement, but has not received a response at the time of publication.
Many members of the public that voted for the bird commented that it was small, active and red, much like Singapore.
Other contenders were the White-bellied Sea-eagle, which was second in the vote count, followed by the Black-naped Oriole, Olive-backed Sunbird and the Greater-Racket-tailed Drongo.
One interesting fact about the Crimson Sunbird is that it was collected and named by none other than Singapore’s founder Stamford Raffles, who published his findings in a journal.
The bird can be seen at places like the Bukit Timah Nature Reserve, Central Catchment Nature Reserve, Pulau Ubin, Bukit Batok Nature Park, Singapore Botanic Gardens, Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve, according to the Lee Kong Chian Natural History Museum.
Considering the small voting pool, it’s no wonder that hardly anyone knows about the Crimson Sunbird and many people believe the crane or joke that the Singapore Airlines is the national bird.
