Flaco, a Eurasian eagle-owl who escaped the Central Park Zoo last year and captured New Yorkers’ hearts, shocked fans last month when he died after colliding with an Upper West Side building.
The beloved bird’s official cause of death has not been determined, according to a spokesperson for the Wildlife Conservation Society, which operates the zoo. But it has renewed discussion on the dangers for wildlife living and existing in the nation’s largest city.
Last year, the city’s Parks Department sent 11 dead animals to the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation’s Wildlife Health Unit to reveal their cause of death.
THE CITY obtained the 2023 necropsies of those animals via Freedom of Information request, and found many of the birds, mostly Red-tailed hawks, were poisoned by rodenticide.
Although pesticides are restricted in the city’s public parks, birds still often eat rats who have consumed poison somewhere else — and they are often slower, and easier to grab, because of it. As such, rat poison has been a frequent cause of death for other animals, particularly birds, according to previous years’ necropsies reviewed by THE CITY.
Barry the owl, another beloved bird who died in 2021 after colliding with a Central Park Conservancy vehicle, was found with high traces of rat poison in her system that veterinarians believe could have impaired her flying.
The Parks Department has restrictions on if and when it can use rodenticides in its parks; it is suspended during the nesting season, which runs February through August, and also whenever there is a breeding pair of birds of prey present in an area, according to a spokesperson.
But the natural world still poses many dangers to wild animals. Last year, the Urban Park Rangers conducted 1,380 animal rescues across the city, according to Marc Sanchez, the deputy director of the rangers.
The dangers in New York City are different for each type of animal.
“The greatest threats to different bird species vary; for waterfowl, it tends to be trash and fishing line left near water bodies, leading to entanglement. Birds of prey are most endangered by rodenticides, while songbirds primarily suffer from human impacts,” Sanchez wrote.
Last year, a coyote was found dead on a highway, likely struck by a vehicle. Turtles died in a pond during construction at a Queens park. And some of the birds, although later poisoned to death, had previously been shot.
Cataloging the Corpses
The 2023 list of animal causes of deaths sheds light on not just what killed the beasts, but what hazards they had to deal with in life.
Last year, three Red-tailed hawks were found dead at Fort Greene Park in Brooklyn, according to the necropsy for one of the birds. (Only two of those birds appeared to have necropsies performed, however.)
One female juvenile hawk was found in a garden bed in the park, with damage to her right leg likely caused by being previously shot with an air gun pellet, according to the report conducted last April. But it was the high concentration of rat poison that likely killed her, veterinarians wrote.
Another red-tailed hawk was found at the bottom of the Monument Steps at the park months later, killed by rat poison, according to the necropsy.
Up in The Bronx, a peregrine falcon was found dead near Jacobi Medical Center and brought to nearby Pelham Bay Park. A necropsy found it died of the Avian flu.
A Red-tailed hawk was found dead at Orchard Beach parking lot in The Bronx, its body emaciated, its necropsy found. Experts ruled the cause was starvation.
An adult Cooper’s hawk was found on the Crotona Malls near the parkway, with blunt impact determined as its cause of death — although it had also previously been shot by an air pellet rifle, her necropsy found. It’s not clear if the hawk had been struck by a car.
An adult female coyote was found dead near the High Bridge, likely due to a vehicle strike, veterinarians found.
Coyotes aren’t totally uncommon across New York City, and prey on the smaller animals present throughout the five boroughs to survive. The necropsy for this coyote, estimated to be around a year and a half old, found raccoon hairs, bones, and claws inside her stomach. She was sent to the DEC for a necropsy and to also possibly contribute to genetic research, according to her report.
In Queens, an after-hatch male Merlin falcon was found dead on the beach in Arverne, with rodenticide as its cause of death.
Queens was also the final resting place of several turtles at Bowne Park Pond in Flushing. A necropsy was formed on one Florida soft-shell turtle, whose death was ruled a bacterial infection, particularly shell rot disease, according to its necropsy. The Urban Park Rangers who sent the turtle up for examination noted its death could be related to ongoing construction at the park — which a spokeswoman noted is working to improve conditions at the pond for other turtles
In Manhattan, a Red-tailed hawk was found dead in the parking lot of Tavern on the Green in Central Park, with blood around its beak and mouth. Rodenticide was listed as the cause of death, and two rat feet and whiskers were still present in the bird’s intestines.
Another female Red-tailed hawk was found on a walking path in the park, also killed by rat poison.
And finally, just outside the park, a Red-tailed hawk was found dead on the steps of the Museum of the City of New York. Although its ultimate cause of death was not determined, the young male bird did have “potentially lethal levels” of rodenticide. The veterinarians also didn’t rule out a possible bacterial infection, according to the necropsy.