Leucistic Black-bellied Sandgrouse - Nizzana, Israel. November 10th, 2010.
Leucistic Black-bellied Sandgrouse (center) - Nizzana, Israel. November 10th, 2010. The only image of the underparts. The black belly patch and undersides to the primaries appear washed out gray, not black.After years of looking at sandgrouse in Israel I don't recall ever seeing an aberrant bird of any species but this 'blond' Black-bellied Sandgouse stood out like a sore thumb! It was roughly comparable to seeing a first-year white-winged gull amongst a flock of Herring Gulls. Nice bird indeed and one of the highlights of a fantastic morning watching sandgrouse in Nizzana. By pure coincidence, Martin Garner has just posted an interesting feature on leucism on his excellent Birding Frontiers blog.
3 comments:
An interesting bird.
Hi James,
Just wanted to say what a good trip this was and thanks for everything. We have now put a couple of posts up from Israel. Sure we'll meet up again.
John and Sue
Hey John and Sue!
Just been enjoying your recent Israel sets. I hope someone chimes in with an id on all those butterflies! Great images, by the way. You did much better than me on the sparrow-lark and the Striated Scops Owl - grrrr!
It was a pleasure having you another tour.
Hope to see you again before too long!
Cheers,
James
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