While that may be true in many instances I have had a DEJU in my feeders for two winters in a row that has a tail with the outer, left rectrice that is white. It has been white for two years now and I expect if the bird has survived another year it will be white this year as well. We have affectionately nicknamed him 'white-butt'

Cheers

Doug

--- dgrainger at birdsbydave.com wrote:

From: dgrainger at birdsbydave.com
To: Tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu>
Subject: [Tweeters] More info : Black-Capped Chickadee with white tail
Date: Wed, 29 Sep 2021 15:06:48 -0700

Did a bit of Googling, found the following appearing on a couple of
sites: "the white tail is sometimes caused by normally colored tail
feathers being dropped during a fright molt, growing back in white. It
will return to normal on the following molt."

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Black-Capped Chickadee with white tail
Date: 2021-09-29 14:54
From: dgrainger at birdsbydave.com
To: Tweeters <tweeters at u.washington.edu>

There is a Black-Capped Chickadee on our feeders with a white tail. I
took a number of photos (Port Townsend, WA on Castle Hill.) I am curious
as to whether this is an aberration or is it simply a molt phase where a
black feather is gone revealing a white one... I would be happy to email
the image privately to anyone that would look at it and advise... Dave
Grainger
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