“What bird is that drinking at the pond?†Nancy said. “Come see.â€
It was a black-ish bird with an orange breast and a white head.
“I guess it’s a robin with a white head,†I responded, and I had never seen one before.
It’s a result of leucism when defects in pigment cells cause afflicted birds or animals to become whitish, or more commonly, a mix of whitened zones along with normally pigmented areas. The latter are often referred to as “piebald,” although the patchwork pattern is formally known as hypopigmentation. White-tailed deer are perhaps best-known in this region for producing piebald offspring.
Robins have a distinct white spot of their heads as it is and I suppose those small white feathers simply expand with leucism.
Actually, there is a robin that comes naturally with a white head. It’s a white-headed robin-chat found in parts of Africa. The head is entirely white.
About once a year, we see a strange leucistic bird in our yard – sometimes a grackle or maybe a cardinal. We haven’t seen our white-headed robin friend since that morning, but I hope he’ll be back.