Unidentified garden bird

[Catrin]

Hi,
There was a very strange bird in my Hertfordshire garden for a short while this morning. I have no idea what it could possibly be, and I'm sorry I don't have a photo of it - if it reappears I'll give it a go, however small it is in the picture.

In the absence of a photo I'll have to try and remember what we could see from the bathroom window. In general outline, appearance, beak, behaviour, etc it looked like a rather fluffy juvenile tit. It was a lot larger than the blue tits that were also around at the same time. However, it had a white tail, and the outer feathers of its wings were also white. Three feathers on the left, and two on the right.

Its back, head and the rest of its wings were brown (ish?) - a bit sparrow like - I know I should have paid more attention to that but I was so astonished to see it that I didn't.

Its chest was a sort of apricot orange - very bright, but washed out towards the edges. It also had a patch of orange on the back of its neck - not symmetrical, but skewed around to the left hand side.

It sat on the edge of the bird bath for a while, and the other birds around gave it a very wide berth - veering off from landing at the last minute.

It looked like nothing I have ever seen, my current guess is that it is some kind of mutant, especially since the markings are not symmetrical. Or, alternatively, could it be an escapee?

Any suggestions?
Cheers

[Fieldfare95]

Welcome to WAB
My guess is a juvenile blackbird with Leusism(not sure on spelling), which would explain the white feathers.

[Catrin]

Originally Posted by Fieldfare95

Welcome to WAB
My guess is a juvenile blackbird with Leusism(not sure on spelling), which would explain the white feathers.

No, sorry, it was nothing like as big as a blackbird, and it was showing the same type of behaviour as a tit. I would say that it looked like a large great tit in shape, and the beak was the same short one as a tit.

However, your suggestion of leucism might be on the right track - I've found a picture of a Leucistic Great Tit, which is much whiter than what we saw, but has something of the same type of apricot colouring about it, although the one we saw was much more orange.

This could be the explanation, does anyone know if it is likely to survive for very long with this rather obvious colouration?
Cheers

[Catrin]

Sorry about the quality of the images here, they were taken at a distance on a small camera. Being a beginner here it took me a while to work out how to post pictures.

I can now see that this is nothing like a tit (it helps to be wearing my glasses) - but what is it? Is it some kind of finch? In one of the photos it seems to have a reddish colouration around the eyes.

[Jonners]

Hi Catrin. Well done for getting some pics of the bird - we can all see it now. I reckon it is, as you wondered, an escapee, possibly some kind of canary. Having said that, I'm happy to bow to someone's greater knowledge, but I'll keep having a look online for similar images.

[Jonners]

Just a thought, can you see any rings on its legs?

[Catrin]

Thanks Jonners,
No, we haven't noticed any kind of rings, but it did return briefly a couple of minutes ago, if it comes back again we'll try to see if there is anything like that.
Cheers

[tombom]

Not an expert on this sort of thing, but it looks like a greenfinch hybrid of some sort judging from GREENFINCH CROSSES

[Tursiops2]

Hi Catrin, welcome to WAB.
I'm pretty sure your bird is a leucistic Sparrow, quite possibly a Tree Sparrow. Do you get Tree Sparrows in your garden?
T2

[Lance Morgan]

Its a 'mule' i.e. escaped cage bird hybrid. Most likely canary cross.