Subject: [Tweeters] Re: Mystery Chickadee
Date: Mar 13 15:07:41 2010
From: Josh Hayes - josh at blarg.net


Joe writes:



>A strange "black-capped" chickadee has been visiting my backyard this
winter. "Strange" as in it *looks >*different and it *sounds *different*.
*



>Its look differs in that its nape and upper mantle feathers are extensively
white, unlike the grayish-green >napes/mantles of regular bc chickadees.
Otherwise, it's just about the same as all the others.



>Its sound is what makes me wonder...it's "dee dee dee" call has a
dramatically different tone. In fact, I can >identify this individual
chickadee with 100% accuracy when he comes by without even so much as a
glance. The >rhythm is the same, but the tone is much drier, more like
"dah-dah-dah" instead of the usual "dee-dee-dee".



Joe, if you were closer to North Seattle I'd say you stole my weird
chickadee!



I had one exactly as you describe - my son got all excited about this "weird
chickadee" he was seeing - in my back yard a couple weeks ago. He was
resident for about four days, and yes, his call was almost a cross between a
chickadee "dee dee dee" and a nuthatch "yank yank yank". I figured it was
just partially leucistic, but now I'm wondering what the heck is going on.
Do the local chickadee species (BC, CB, and Mountain) interbreed at all? I'm
not sure that provides any kind of explanation either, though. Just a crazy
idea from a crazy guy.



-Josh Hayes in North Seattle

Josh at blarg dot net