My friend Kathleen Anderson, who has a wilderness retreat, Wintermoon Summersun, in Brimson (less than a mile from my Breeding Bird Survey route), has been getting a partial albino chickadee since March 9. It's a really cool looking bird--its head is mostly white, but it also has pink legs and toes, with just a bit of pigment on some of the claws. I went over to look at it yesterday. Photographing it was frustrating--it was much more skittish than her other chickadees. But I did post some photos of it here:
http://birderblog.com/bird/Species/Titmice/Black-cappedChickadee/BCCHGallery.html Laura Erickson Duluth, MN Staff Ornithologist Binoculars.com www.birderblog.com There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of birds. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature--the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter. --Rachel Carson