Big Bird is perhaps the least used character in international Sesame Street adaptations.

Instead, most shows have their own walk-around Big Bird equivalent, often a bird like Caponata on Spain's Barrio Sésamo, or Minik Kuş on Turkey's Susam Sokağı. Since Big Bird is primarily a Street character, his few inserts are seldom used. Zhima Jie in China employs Big Bird's "identical cousin" Da Niao (literally, "Big Bird").

The following, however, are a few of the productions where the real Big Bird is dubbed and/or renamed.

Book Translations

Big Bird's many book appearances, when translated into other languages, have been inconsistent in their name usage, and often borrow the name of that country's Big Bird counterpart. Thus, in Dutch translations, Big Bird is often presented as Pino from Sesamstraat. He justifies this in the album Ernie Heeft Rommel Gemaakt (collecting Ernie's Big Mess and other stories), by claiming he's wearing his yellow feather suit.

The Spanish translations for Mexico and the Southwest United States of America are particularly inconsistent. In some books, apparently intended primarily for bilingual Americans, no attempts at translation are made at all, as in A Visit to the Sesame Street Library, where'e he's simply "Big Bird." In the 1991 translation of Nothing to Do (Nada Que Hacer), he's "Gran Pajaro" (while Granny Bird is "Abuelita" and Radar is "Tito"). However, Big Bird Goes to the Doctor is translated as Montoya Va el Doctor, borrowing the name of the bird on Plaza Sésamo.

Other Translations

During Big Bird's 1984 filming in Australia, the local media reported that the character was known as "Oki Na Tori" in China.[1]