The flamingo has taken one big elegant step toward becoming Florida’s official state bird.
No, it isn’t already, even though it’s on a lot of postcards, possibly too many front lawns, and part of the Florida Lottery logo. There’s also a 21-foot-long flamingo named Phoebe that greets visitors at the central terminal in the Tampa International Airport.
The actual Florida state bird, for the last 100 years or so, has been the mockingbird. But that’s also the official state bird of Arkansas, Mississippi, Tennessee and Texas, and Florida lawmakers have tried for years to pick something a little more unique.
On Wednesday, Feb. 11, the Florida House voted 112-1 for HB 11 to finally establish the pink-feathered American flamingo (Phoenicopterus ruber) as the Sunshine State’s official state bird.
“If you ask people around the state of Florida what’s the state bird, very few people ever say the mockingbird,” co-sponsor Rep. James ‘Jim’ Mooney, R-Key Largo, told the House Natural Resources and Disasters Subcommittee when he presented the bill, according to Florida Politics. “They’ll say the flamingo, they might say a pelican. But the reality of it is, the flamingo represents Florida, it always has since I was a kid.”
A companion Senate bill (SB 150) from Sen. Ana Maria Rodriguez, R-Doral, was unanimously approved by the Environment and Natural Resources committee in November but still has to pass through two more committees before it faces a full Senate vote.
This wouldn’t be the only bird getting the top perch. Both bills also establish the Florida scrub jay (Aphelocoma coerulescens) as the official Florida state songbird.
This marks the ninth time an attempt to dethrone the mockingbird has been made over the past quarter-century. A promising attempt in last year’s session was getting unanimous votes at every point but was derailed in May 2025 so Florida lawmakers could focus instead on the still-unfinished final 2025-26 state budget. Both bills died in committees the next month.
Will the measure finally take flight this time?
Should the flamingo be the Florida state bird?
The flamboyant, 5-foot-tall flamingo has been used to promote travel to the state for over a century, supporters say, as a symbol of brightly colored sunshine and fun. The Florida Lottery has used it in its logo since it was established in 1988. Homes across the state have long been festooned with bright pink plastic versions. There aren’t a lot of Florida mockingbird magnets for sale out there.
Widely distributed throughout the Caribbean and parts of South America, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission considers flamingos native to the state. A University of Central Florida-led study proved it to be true in an analysis that published in December 2025.
Flamingos were common in South Florida until the end of the 19th century, when trends turned to feathers on women’s hats and hunters slaughtered millions of birds in the Everglades. The last resident flamingos in Florida were nearly wiped out but have bounced back thanks to captive breeding colonies in South Florida, migratory birds flying in from elsewhere and Hurricane Idalia blowing hundreds of them to Florida three years ago.
The flocks continue to struggle, however, thanks to threats from rising sea levels, pollution, human development and storms.
American flamingos have been seen along much of the coast but mostly in the Everglades, Biscayne Bay and the Florida Keys, the FWC said.
Why is a scrub jay a better choice for Florida state songbird?
For one thing, the scrub jay is uniquely Floridian.
“It is actually the only bird that never leaves the state of Florida, it is endemic to the state,” Mooney said, “so it is here to stay unless we bulldoze it to extinction.”
Florida scrub jays are blue and gray birds that prefer sand pine, oak scrub and scrubby flatwoods and they live in the driest areas, “including ancient sandy ridges in Central Florida, sand dunes along the coast, and sandy deposits along rivers in the interior of the state,” according to a 2025 analysis of the former bill.
Scrub jays have also been designated a federally threatened species and are protected by Florida’s Endangered and Threatened Species Act and by the federal Migratory Bird Treaty Act due to habitat fragmentation from development, agriculture and fire-suppression efforts that prevent them from easily moving from one suitable habitat to another.
Rep. Monique Miller, R-Palm Bay, was the lone lawmaker to vote against the bill in committee because while she said she supported the flamingo part, she could not elevate the scrub jay because of how it has been used to block development in the state.
“The scrub jay has just been commandeered to really violate property rights across Florida,” she said. “I wish these were de-coupled because I want to make the flamingo your bird so badly.”
What do scrub jays sound like?
The song of a Florida scrub jay varies and has been described as a scratchy weep, a harsh scold, or a gutteral growl, according to All About Birds.
Why has Florida kept the mockingbird?
One problem with the flamingo’s potential state birdiness: they’re not found everywhere in the state. The mockingbird is.
The mockingbird, while common to other states, is a year-round Florida resident and can be seen all over the state. It has a “pleasant lilting sound,” according to the Florida State Department, and is capable of mimicking other sounds. It feeds on insects and weed seeds.
It has also had a powerful champion.
Marion Hammer, a longtime lobbyist for the National Rifle Association, aggressively fought off any attempts to change the state bird ever since the first attempt to install the scrub jay a quarter century ago and has accused scrub jay supporters of promoting a scam for environmentalists to block development.
She reiterated her claim again in 2023 in an opinion piece for the Tallahassee Democrat that said the mockingbird was a “well-established, independent, prolific bird” that has “never needed government protection or our tax dollars to survive.” Hammer also described the scrub jay as “evil little birds that steal other birds’ eggs and kill the babies of other birds.”
Hammer stepped down from her lobbyist position for the NRA in 2022 after four decades.
Rep. Alex Andrade, R-Pensacola, who has pushed for the pelican to be a co-official state bird, was the sole House member to vote against the bill, saying, “I also maintain a healthy fear/respect of the great and inimitable, Marion Hammer. I promised her back in 2018 that I’d never disappoint her with my votes, I planned on keeping that promise.”
A different bill would let kids vote instead
Rather than simply declaring a new state bird(s), SB 264 from Sen. Tina Scott Polsky, D-Boca Raton, would require the FWC to conduct a survey to determine if the state should switch things up.
The survey would be conducted among participants in the Florida Youth Conservation Centers Network summer camps during summer 2026 and summer 2027, and must include the following options:
Results must be reported by Dec. 31, 2027.
When would the flamingo and scrub jay become the Florida state birds?
If HB 11 and SB 150 are passed by the legislature and signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis, the act would take effect July 1, 2026.
C.A. Bridges is a journalist for the USA TODAY Network-Florida’s service journalism Connect team. You can get all of Florida’s best content directly in your inbox each weekday day by signing up for the free newsletter, Florida TODAY.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Is the flamingo or scrub jay Florida’s state bird? What we know
Reporting by C. A. Bridges, USA TODAY NETWORK – Florida / Tallahassee Democrat
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
