Nice Song Sparrow! This reminded me of a crow I saw this last Friday in the
Wallingford neighborhood of Seattle. It had practically symmetrical white
patches in the middle of both wings (about where primaries and secondaries
meet, also a bit of the coverts were white as well). It didn't look like
dye or paint, it looked like a leucistic coloration. I don't remember
seeing a case like this - symmetrical coloration (or lack of coloration
rather). Does anyone know how common this is? Or maybe someone knows of
some study the UW might be conducting with crows (seems unlikely because the
bird wasn't banded). Anyway - thanks!

-Brendan McGarry
Seattle, WA
mcgbre04 at gmail.com


On Feb 4, 2008 9:17 AM, Marvin S. Hoekstra <marvin.hoekstra at verizon.net>
wrote:

> On Saturday afternoon (Feb 2) I spotted and photographed an unusual white
> headed sparrow in with a group of song sparrows. Does anyone know what
> would cause such an unusual coloration?
>
>
>
> http://www.flickr.com/photos/21019806 at N05/
>
>
>
> Marvin S. Hoekstra
>
> Sammamish, WA
>
> marvin dot hoekstra at verizon dot net
>
>
>
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>