Albino House Sparrow
Reports
On Monday 10 June, an albino House Sparrow was photographed in the Clachaig area. It was pure white with an absence of colour in the bare areas and with pink eyes. It was being fed by normal coloured House Sparrows. While over the years I have had a number of reports of leucistic birds of various species with varying amounts of white on the feathers, including all white birds , this is the first albino that I have had reported to me. Click here for an article on Leucistic Birds.
Leucistic birds lack some melanin pigment. Albinism is caused by a genetic mutation. Albino individuals are unable to produce any melanin pigment. This leads to a good diagnostic feature with which to distinguish leucistic and albino individuals – the colour of the eye. Albinos have pink eyes while the iris pigmentation of leucistic birds remains dark. True albinos are thought to be rare in the wild.
Being more conspicuous, albino birds have a heighten risk of predation.