Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2018/02/26/one-in-a-million-yellow-ca.html
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Just since January.
Charlie Stephenson first noticed the unusual bird at her backyard feeder in late January
I’d guess a younger adult male. It seems to take a little while for their wings to color-up. I wonder if there will be any more yellow chirpy mutants hatching later in the year?
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I can tell by the pixels.
The video is brief, but in it, the cardinal doesn’t do the common and frequent metallic “pik” call to a mate. So maybe it is young? Or else the red color is key in cardinal mate pairings?
On the other hand, if it’s carotenoids, this diet issue can affect the red of other birds as well as cardinals; in this case, house finches:
Fun fact: “finch” in German is “fink.” Which is sad, since house finks and gold finks are not even close to being the finkiest birds out there.
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