Subject: Re: Redpolls?
Date: Nov 13 11:12:41 1996
From: Dennis Paulson - dpaulson at mail.ups.edu


>The bird that was seen at the feeder has not returned ....at least not while
>I've been watching. But, I'll continue to make sure the feeder is full and
>see if I can bring it back. (Paul Cozens-I'll let you know)
>Dennis asked if I could elaborate........I'll try.....
>I couldn't say that the bird was noticeably smaller than a house finch. My
>impression was that it was about the same size. It was feeding a little
(snip)
>The tail was darker than a house finch. It was the whiteness of the head and
>the bright red cap that was most attention grabbing. Legs were pinkish. The
>bird was definetly shy. I got my binocs and crouched behind the sofa to look
>at it. It saw the binocs peering over the back of the couch, stared for a
>few seconds and took off. My friend saw it take off and said that the flight
>pattern was very undulating.
>Gosh, I hope it returns so I can verify my original impressions.

>From Songbird's description, my parsimonious conclusion is that the bird in
question was a partial albino House Finch. A redpoll really should look
obviously smaller than a House Finch, and a Common Redpoll doesn't have a
particularly white head. A lot of albinism affects only the melanin
(brown, black) pigments on birds, so, for example, you can get a white
Red-winged Blackbird that still has red epaulettes. A partial albino House
Finch might have a red cap that would be much more apparent than that of a
normal bird. The red color is distributed differently in the two species,
but this might be subtle. A major difference would be that a House Finch
would have a red rump, a redpoll a pale rump. Also, the House Finch has a
rather heavy typical finch bill, the redpoll a slender bill for a finch.

Dennis Paulson, Director phone 206-756-3798
Slater Museum of Natural History fax 206-756-3352
University of Puget Sound e-mail dpaulson at ups.edu
Tacoma, WA 98416
web site: http://www.ups.edu/biology/museum/museum.html