Friday, December 31, 2004

Confused Dove

What on earth is schizochroism? I'm certainly not sure - after all, there is enough argument about the definition of alibinism and leucism. It appears to be a plumage abnormality that leads to very pale brown, almost whitish, feathering. It may apply to this Collared Dove, first noticed in my garden on 24 December, although some feathers appear to be two-toned, some normal and some whitish. The overall effect is a strikingly pale bird. Unfortunately it is an irregular visitor but I managed some better pics this morning. Comments welcome.

Collared Dove (Streptopelia decaocto)




A regular plumaged bird for comparison:

All digiscoped with the Nikon CP995, Leica APO77 and 20x eyepiece.

1 comment:

Steve said...

Definately schizochroic and very similar to the three birds (three different generations) present in my garden from 2002-2004. See photo on my blog at http://toadsnatcher.blogspot.com/2003_03_01_toadsnatcher_archive.html