Deborah,

Could it have been a varied thrush? They are not pale, but they do
whistle in a distinctive manner, and they can be confused with robins.

Laura Friend
Newcastle, WA
lcf at u.washington.edu


On Tue, 3 Apr 2001, Deborah Wisti-Peterson wrote:

>
> hello tweets,
>
> yesterday, as i was cutting across campus, i saw a very pale (female?)
> american robin that, upon closer inspection, turned out to have a
> large white area on her belly, with white blotches on her breast.
> overall, she (?) was quite pale and washed-out, looking like someone
> had run her through the wash with a little bleach added!
>
> nice looking bird, i thought!
>
> she (?) was with several other normally-colored robins, all female.
> one of these birds -- i'd like to think it was this pale one -- was
> making a sort of singing sound, not a typical robin's song, but a
> sort of whistle. since the other two birds were picking worms from the
> soil, and this pale bird was simply standing still, i thought that
> this bird might also be some sort of ventrilloquist, since the beak was
> pressed shut, but sound was still being made.
>
> this really happened, it is not a late april fool's joke. although, i
> am most pleased to know that a few of you, at least, did enjoy that
> little joke i passed on to the list the other day (heehee). i was
> especially delighted to send out a few "gotcha!" messages, too.
>
> regards,
>
> Deborah Wisti-Peterson, PhD Candidate nyneve at u.washington.edu
> Department of Zoology, University of Washington, Seattle, Wash, USA
> Visit me on the web: http://students.washington.edu/~nyneve/
> Love the creator? Then protect the creation.
>
>