I have seen one leucistic Evening Grosbeak. Never seen a true albino. I have a seen two partial albino House Finches, one partial albino American Golfinch, and a partial albino Chipping Sparrow.

That is all I can remember at the moment but their may have been more. Have been birdwatching for 24 years.

BN

Great thread!
I have seen 1 partial albino house finch and one true albino American Robin. The house finch came to a feeder for 2 winters-I never saw him in the summer but he may have been around as I feed all year. I have been watching birds (mostly backyard birds) for about 30 years.
Susan

As I said on the other discussion, I see at least one per feeder season. Makes me wonder if there aren't some 'pockets' of high mutation rates, or gene pools.

This winter, I'd have to look at hubby's notes. I just asked him, and it was a gold finch and I saw one rather common sparrow with a large white patch on the crown.

Had a robin all last summer who was completely devoid of pigment in the feathers. One of them I remember from a previous year was a downy woodpecker. He was so pied in places he shouldn't have been, I thought he was some extremely rare, totally out of place species.......but it wasn't. Just a very affected downy.

A year or so before that, we had a male cardinal who was so light, he was a pale golden yellow. I have pictures of that somewhere on a floppy. I know diet levels of carotene feed into the saturation of their red feathers, but this one wasn't even orange.

Many of these I have never bothered to even photograph, as I hadn't realised it was supposedly so uncommon to see one of them in a year's time.

ive seen a leucistic palm warbler hehe.

I've seen an albino crow, evidently fledged in our neighborhood and only seen once, had a leucistic carolina chickadee one summer, white on wings and tail. I think I remember a couple of leucistic from my childhood, but consulting with my mother we don't remember species, perhaps mourning dove and chickadee or towhee? Feeding and watching birds >50 years.

I have to say that I am quite suprised at all the reports! But then, I'mm relatively a newbie with just 3 years experience (of serious birdwatching anyway) .

I've only seen one - a partial albino bluejay that we named PapaSmurf. I know I've posted pictures of Papa before, but here he is again.

{{gwi:169735}}

There are more pictures of Papa Smurf here on my website.

I did report Papa to project Feeder Watch and they thought that he was also missing the barbs on his feathers which gave him his "fluffy" appearance. They featured Papa Smurf on their project feature watch page here.

I guess the question now is ..... has anyone not seen an albinistic or leucistic bird?

I had an albino grackle fledgling feeding on my property for almost a week... it stopped a few days ago, so I hope he/she is safe! I've been birding for about 30 years.
Here's a few of the many pics I was SO lucky to get.. the close up clicks are really fun!
Dydee~

Here is a link that might be useful:

I have a partial leucistic house finch that visits the feeder and have seen two different partial leucistic red tailed hawks in the area (there seems to be a total of 5 in a three county area - Mid Hudson Valley region NY) - they are gorgeous to see.

Here is a link that might be useful: Partial Leucistic Red-Tailed Hawk

I've seen one leucistic house finch. I've been birding about 6 years.

Love that bluejay!
This is a grackle (I think). I saw it at a local Sonic several times then never saw it again. All grackles should be this pretty. lol

It's the only Leucistic bird I can remember seeing and have never seen a full albino bird.

I've seen a Yellow-headed Blackbird which had a yellow head but was otherwise pure white, quite a lovely bird. It wintered here at a man-made wetland park for at least two years but didn't show this past winter.

Other than that, I've seen a number of birds with a few out-of-place white feathers but can't recall any specific species.

A leucistic Am Kestral showed up in SE AZ, looked like a cross between a budgie and a kestral, but I only saw the photos (photos are on the AZFO.org website).

I've been birding just shy of 22 years.

-O-

I've been actively bird-watching for about 9 years, and haven't seen any leucistic or albino birds.

If only people who have seen leucistic or albino birds report, the statistics will make it appear that these conditions are not so rare.

I'm linking to the photos of the kestral I mentioned before, from the AZFO.org website. Such a pretty bird, I wanted to share even though I never saw the actual bird. I'll see if I can find photos of the blackbird and link later.

-O-

Here is a link that might be useful: Leucistic Am Kestral

The only albino native bird I have ever seen was not in the wild, but in this exhibit at the Skeinesboro Museum in Whitehall, NY, some 30 miles west of us. This white robin was preserved via taxidermy approximately a century ago if I remember correctly and it once inhabited our local area. Sorry for the poor quality - bad lighting, slow shutter speed without a tripod.

{{!gwi}}

We have a Leucistic Rubythroated Hummingbird at our feeders the past few days. I have been bird watching for 3 years and feeding Hummers since May 2007. We have 5 feeders and have 10-20 birds at peak feeding times.
Here is a link to my video and pictures of the bird.

Here is a link that might be useful: Luecistic Albino Hummingbird

Hi,

I have been actively watching and feeding birds for about two months, and about a month ago a part albino chickadee visited. The left side of his face was a solid pure white, from the top of his head most of the way down his cheek, and around his left eye. He was sitting on our deck railing. It was such an unusual sight, I had to call my husband to see it. (I did take a photo but I am not well versed in posting photos yet.)

Great video footage of your luecistic albino hummingbird, civic! He really stands out!

Several years ago I saw a leucistic mourning dove in our yard. And last week I saw a leucistic squirrel -- but that doesn't count, right?

We had been told there was a white bird in our area. When we went to look this is what we saw

From 2009-04-15 300d

A few yards from this tree we also saw this

From 2009-04-16 cardinal

I am reposting with bigger images. I'm learning...my first post.

From 2009-04-16 cardinal
From 2009-04-15 300d

I run a website for birders that report sightings to me on a regular basis. I receive about 6-8 reports annually of leucistic birds. I have had reports of Blue Jays, Cardinals, House Finch, Common Grackles, one duck (can't remember what kind, but not Mallard), House Sparrow, American Robin, Downy Woodpecker.

An interesting sighting: 2 reports (in different states) of Downy Woodpecker with orange coloring.

Here are some pics of a male grackle that has claimed my neighborhood as its home for at least 3 years in a row. If it's not the same bird, now THAT would be unusual. The first time I saw it, for a second I thought a magpie had gotten lost and was stuck in Dallas, TX USA. I see it almost every other time I spend any amount of time in the yard. It's funny to watch it courting or competing with other males when it struts and fluffs up.

http://www.rivergeek.com/birds/grackle-partial-albinism.jpg
http://www.rivergeek.com/birds/grackle-partial-albinism2.jpg
http://www.rivergeek.com/birds/grackle-partial-albinism3.jpg

Here is a link that might be useful: {{!gwi}}

This past winter - a blue jay that I almost didn't recognize as a blue jay, it had so much white in its coloration. It was large, full grown. Against the snowy tree that it was perched on it was quite striking and unusual.

I've been watching birds for just about a year.

Wow interesting thread with great photos!

I've not seen any albino or leucistic birds as yet. I've been feeding and watching about 4 years.

Nice photos!
Here's a wikipedia link to more on the subject, which includes some of the photos on this thread. If the bird has normal-colored eyes, it's leucistic, since albinism doesn't affect the eye color genes
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leucistic

This past winter there was a lovely little leucistic female Vermillion Flycatcher at Sweetwater Wetlands in Tucson. She was associating with a pair of regularly coloured birds. Photos at AZFO.org.

-O-

Here is a link that might be useful: leucistic Vermillion Flycatcher

Link to photos of the leucistic Kestral I mentioned earlier in the thread.

-O-

Here is a link that might be useful: leucistic Kestral

WoW-amazing topic...I only heard of leucistic last year when I realized there was a chickadee that was different-it had a white tail...It stayed around I'm assuming until its peeps were born, only because both sets of chickadee's stopped coming to the feeders-one set later returned-the other pair with the leucistic tail didn't...

Such beautiful photos of unusual birds!

Spotted this female leucistic Goldeneye in SF bay area.

Beautiful pic, jellis50! The bird and the water ripples complement each other.

Claire

Thank you. She almost blends in.

We had a red tail hawk around here a couple of years ago that was white with dark wings. At first I thought it was a mississippi kite from the markings. Then it took off and I could see the red tail. Leucistic birds don't seem to be all that uncommon. I have a friend who said she saw a leucistic red tail hawk on a trip she took this year. Someone from our audubon groups claims to have a leucistic crow on her property.

P.S. I spotted the redtail hawk my first year as an official birder.

I had a leucistic bird which you guys were able to ID for me (I hadn't realized birds could be albino or leucistic, so I had no idea what I'd found). I can't remember what it was, no... grackle... cowbird...

I first saw "Lucy" the leucistic quail in April, 2011. She was back in our neighborhood all last summer. And now she is back (Feb 2013) with two apparent offspring. See photos attached.

a fledgling lewis's woodpecker from two years ago last year he was back with just scattered splotches of white and none this spring hah any white patches

Thanks everyone for your posts. It's so interesting to see what other people are seeing in different locations. :-)

I've seen several albino and leucistic birds in the West Desert of Utah in the last few years. It's funny this thread started, because my BF and I were just commenting on the fact that we seem to see a large number of these birds - compared to other areas of the country I have lived.

The best (to me) was a White Raven. After it fledged, I never saw it again. We routinely see leucistic Eurasian Collared Doves with various amounts of white. And last summer we had a white House Sparrow for many months. We also have various colors of House Finch - from the normal red to other shades of orange and yellow.

I have been birding for 30+ years, but I'll only comment on these ones I've seen in the last 4-5 years in Utah. It's always fun seeing something a little different :-) Candy

This post was edited by zaffisc on Tue, Feb 26, 13 at 13:15