Here is the “bald-headed” or leucistic Black-Capped Chickadee that has been coming and going at the home of Scott Saintsbury in Moretown. Note the white head!!! Scott had to shoot through a window on a dreary day so the shutter speed was low. And, the bird would not stand still. Scott reports that he was lucky to get him/her at all — as it usually just stayed for a seed or two and then bolted.
(Editor’s Note: Don’t worry about photo quality when shooting rare birds Scott. If anyone had gotten this good a shot of the Ivory Billed Woodpecker down south, there would no longer be any doubt about its continued existence.)
February 15th, 2014 at 1:11 am
I was so glad to find this page about a white-headed black-capped chickadee, as well as a YouTube video about another person seeing a similar bird. I feed “my chickadees” every day and, so far this winter, have seen one of these gorgeous “freaks of nature”, although with more white on the head, with almost a marbled effect. I was able to get one picture on an old digital camera, but it was taken through 3 panes of glass on a dark snowy day, so it’s difficult to even pick out the bird on the picture, let alone its cap! If I can come up with a better photo, I’ll be sure to pass it along!