One of the great pleasures of birding is that you can run into something new and unexpected anytime, anywhere. This summer (June and July 2020) I’ve been birding around my local neighborhood in Deerfield, MA, and even though I’ve lived here for three years now, every day still brings new discoveries. A recent morning produced […]
Scarlet Tanagers are bright red – but this one is yellow Read More »
In early December 2016, David Pierce of Wildwood, Missouri, noticed an odd woodpecker at his feeder and took some really nice photos. I always marvel at the path these kinds of stories follow: Dave had to be looking carefully enough to notice the slight differences in this bird, make the effort to take some good
A melanistic Downy Woodpecker Read More »
I wrote about white Great Blue Herons in 2007, and thanks to a recent comment there by David Ammerman alerting me to a whitish Great Blue Heron chick in a nest, I made the short trip to Bolton, MA yesterday (July 7, 2016). It was not hard to find the nest, and I was able
A white Great Blue Heron in Massachusetts Read More »
This beautiful and striking bird is a partial albino Northern Flicker, photographed in Massachusetts in Sep 2015 by Michael Beagan. A second, very similar, bird had been photographed nearby in 2012 by John Harrison, and – besides being very attractive birds – the two provide a good opportunity to discuss some of the details
Thanks to reader Skip Pothier for sending in these photos. They show a Purple Finch with yellow color instead of red. My first thought was to call it a male that didn’t develop the full red pigment (a similar variant due to poor diet and/or poor health is fairly common in male House Finches) but
A Yellow Purple Finch in Ontario Read More »
Here is a photo of a white heron, taken by Constance Mier on the main shoreline of Biscayne Bay National Park, near Miami, Florida, on May 25, 2012. You can see more of Constance’s photos at her webpage: http://cmierphotoandfitness.net/myphotos.html [mtouchquiz 49]
After my post a few days ago about the unusual Cattle Egret in Florida, I heard from two people with interesting observations to add. Robert Edgar and Sarah McKenzie sent the photos featured here and said “We photographed a very similar bird on 1 May 1995 at a breeding colony in the Nile Valley, Egypt.It
More unusual Cattle Egrets Read More »
In late April 2012, Roy Halpin found and photographed an entirely buff-colored Cattle Egret in Saint Augustine, Florida. This is a particularly interesting bird because it provides an opportunity to consider the unusual nature of Cattle Egret coloration, as well as the identification of Cattle Egret subspecies. Coloration in Cattle Egrets To understand this bird’s
An unusual Cattle Egret in Florida Read More »
Dark morph (Cory’s) Least Bittern Note: I have never personally seen a living Cory’s Least Bittern. In fact, only six or so have been seen during my lifetime. Most of what follows is based on a very thorough 1996 research paper by Ron Pittaway and Peter Burke (see References below). The illustration shown below is
The mysterious dark Least Bittern Read More »