Tag Archives: leucistic American Robin

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It's startling when you see an anomaly like this leucistic American Robin. Asa B. Spade noticed this unusual-colored bird just north of Point Arena, on Riverside Road.

You can see that this robin has dark eyes and some of its red-breast, so it's not albino. Here is the definition for leucistic: "An animal condition in which there is partial loss of pigmentation resulting in white, pale, or patchy coloration of the skin, hair, feathers, scales or cuticle, but not the eyes." It's pretty rare so it's a treat to see this bird.

Thanks to Asa for allowing me to share her photo with you here.

We had a quarter inch of rain yesterday. Today has been sunny, breezy and beautiful!

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Ron LeValley photographed the leucistic Black Oystercatcher. The bird fledged from the Mendocino Headlands, and Ron found it on a nearby mussel bed.

We've seen other instances of this. Last year,  Roger Adamson photographed this leusictic Black Oystercatcher chick.

And here's a leucistic American Robin, photographed some years ago by Susan Gonzales.

And a leusictic Dark-eyed Junco, photographed by Barbara Pratt.

It's always startling to see! Thanks to Ron, Susan, Roger and Barbara for allowing me to share their photos with you here. To see much more of Ron's nature photography, here is the link to his website: http://levalleyphoto.com/home/

Sunny, mild day on the Mendonoma coast. Might be a chance to see a green flash at sunset tonight!