Because the long-tailed bat has been named as the 2021 Bird of the Year.
The competition is run by Forest andBird with the public casting their vote for the preferred winner.
The pekapeka-tou-roa received 7031 votes while last year's winner the kākāpō came in at second place with 4072 votes and third place went to the rifleman/titipounamu with 2808.
My favourite bird, the tui, wasn't even in the top 10.
Its distinctive blue, green, and bronze colours and little white throat tuft are eye-catching. It's dual voice boxes mean its birdsong is varied and beautiful.
Linda Hall is assistant editor at Hawke's Bay Today.
I really can't say the same about a bat.
In fact they terrify me. The thought of one fluttering around my head or even worse, landing on me, gives me the heebie-jeebies.
Blame horror movies for that - bats are the bad guys, flying around in scary movies.
So how did this mammal make it into in a "bird of the year" competition?
Forest and Bird spokesperson Lissy Fehnker-Heather reckons that as New Zealand's only native land mammal, classed as nationally critical, it deserved dispensation.
Bats have lots of predators - possums, stoats, rats and cats.
Fehnker-Heather thought the bird competition would be the perfect platform to bring the mammal's plight to our attention.
It's worked.
So does that mean the bat's a bird? Or perhaps its new classification could be Batbird.
If we are breaking down the species barriers, next year it can enter the Man of the Year competition, it's sure to win — voila — Batman is born again.
Could fishing competitions includes dolphins? Absolutely not. We find the notion abhorrent.
Therein lies the problem for the bats.
There is nothing cute and cuddly about bats. No matter what anyone says, people like cute and cuddly.
So as batty as it might seem to have a mammal win a bird contest, the reason for entering has worked - the fright, oops I mean the plight - of the bat has been recognised.
