The winner of the 2025 Best Bird in BC competition has been decided! After five rounds of intense voting, thirty one birds had their dreams cut short, as only one bird could prevail. After an incredibly close final round, winning with a narrow 51% of the vote was…
The Black-capped Chickadee!

It was an intense final round! Thank you to everyone who voted, and a special congratulations to the Song Sparrow for being such a strong competitor. 

The Black-capped Chickadee makes a birder out of all of us with their easy to identify “Chick-a-dee-dee-dee” call. They use this call to alert flock mates of nearby food, their movements, and approaching predators. But this is just one call in their repertoire, the Black-capped Chickadee language is one of the most complex bird languages in the world. Lucky for us, these non-migratory birds stick around all year, allowing us to eaves drop on their fascinating conversations year round. They’ve even evolved to enter regulated periods of hypothermia to survive cold winter nighttime temperatures.

Thomas Magarian, XC544963. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/544963. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

As one of the most widespread songbirds of North America, Song Sparrows are found coast to coast, down to Mexico and up to Southern Alaska. Not just widespread, Song Sparrows have an incredible amount of diversity among their populations, making up 24 subspecies across North America. Individual birds throughout these populations can vary 150% in body mass, and demonstrate quite different vocal repertoires. However, wherever you are, you will always be able to recognize the male Song Sparrow by their distinct, melodic song.

Laura Stewart, XC445656. Accessible at www.xeno-canto.org/445656. Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0

Thank you for your participation, and see you again next March when we’ll crown a new Best Bird in BC for 2026.