Hello,
I'm new here, and don't have any pictures to post just yet but hoping someone can help.
I have a bird table with many visitors including blue tits, great tits and long-tailed tits. Today I've seen what seems to be a great tit but has a white chest and grey back (i.e. not yellow chested with green/blue back). Is this just a variation in colouring?
We also have greenfinches that look fluorescent yellow in flight. My husband insists they're 'wild canaries'.
Is there something in the water around here??
Hello and welcome
I wonder if it could be a male blackcap? Please check the link below.
http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/b/blackcap/index.aspx
I have seen other reports of escaped canaries on here although i have never seen any myself. LOL There must be something in the water, I would love to see a male blackcap in my garden.
One of our experts may come along with a better idea :-)
Kind regards Jane.
Thanks, but it's not a blackcap. It has a wide back stripe down the middle of its chest. I was watching it alongside other great tits and it has similar markings, but different colouring. Seemed to dominate, too, which goes against an article I just found saying that the yellower the chest, the more macho the tit!
Hello and welcome :)
Possble coal tit?
link
and siskin
They match your description, of course a photo (which we all love here) would allow a definate ID
It's both what you do and the way that you do it!
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Unknown said:I wonder if it could be a male blackcap?
Hi Wagtail
If you thought it looked like a tit the other possibilities are coal tit and depending where you live ( i.e. near water) marsh tit.
Let us know if we're on the right track.
Male greenfinches will be starting to develop their spring plumage and can look quite brightly coloured. They have yellow wing bars which are even more noticeable when they fly.
TJ
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Tony
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Thanks guys! This is better than Agatha Christie!
I've seen what I think are Willow Tits around here (on the basis that there's lots of willow and not much marsh!) and they're a lot smaller than the bird I'm talking about. Also, he did have that big black stripe down the centre of his chest.
Of course, I haven't seen it again since I started this thread...
As for the 'wild canary', I'm sure that the birds on my feeder are greenfinches, and they are very colourful, but maybe it's possible that we've also spotted siskins in flight and confused them with the greenfinches...
:-)
Hi there,
The carotenoid pigments that give Great Tits their yellow tummies (and green backs) is derived from diet, so it's possible this Great Tit's either a) not eaten enough foods containing carotenoids or b) has a defect of some kind that means it can't process its carotenoids properly. Great Tits do vary a lot in colour intensity, even the same individual will be brighter at some times of year than others (and males are brighter than females anyway) but if your bird is completely monochrome, I'd be favouring option b. The fact that your local Greenfinches are clearly having no trouble finding carotenoid-rich foods would support that idea too!
ETA - just saw your last message. Willow Tits are very rare in Oxfordshire, so on distribution Marsh Tit is more likely, but you never know! Any photos? The species names are misleading, by the way - Willow Tit has no special tie to willows, and is often found in damper habitat than Marsh Tit.
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Hi Aiki,
Thank you - that sounds like a very reasonable explanation!
wagtail said: Hi Aiki, Thank you - that sounds like a very reasonable explanation!
No worries :) Thinking about it, a similar carotenoid-affecting defect/variation/genetic mutation would be responsible for the blue or grey variants of naturally yellow or green cage birds like Canaries, Budgies and Ring-necked Parakeets.
I've noticed the blue and great tits that visit my garden don't seem very colourful compared with the ones I used to see when I lived in the country or the ones I see in photos on here.
Is there any food I could put out that may boost their coulurs?
Stoat
I'm not bald. I've just got ingrowing hair!
Unknown said: I've noticed the blue and great tits that visit my garden don't seem very colourful compared with the ones I used to see when I lived in the country or the ones I see in photos on here. Is there any food I could put out that may boost their coulurs? Stoat
Not sure - carotenoids are synthesised by plants but degrade quite rapidly once the plant's been harvested and is being stored, so most bird seed mixes and so on will probably not have a lot of carotenoid content by the time we put them out for the birds. Wild birds would get theirs from fresh plant-derived food, and from insects that have fed on carotenoid-containing plants.
You can get 'colour-food' with artifical added carotenoids to help maintain the colour in yellow- and red-plumaged cagebirds, not sure it's a good idea to give this to wild birds though. Probably best to let nature handle this one. There is also natural selection at work - studies show that female Great Tits prefer males with brighter yellow underparts.