Second odd Chorlton bird, seen on 6th March - an unusually large Canada goose with an odd white streak on the lower part of its neck. It didn't have any other features which indicated a domestic goose x Canada hybrid (which i've seen several of), so i guess it's just a slightly unusual Canada:
It reminds me a bit of the "intersex" bird here: http://10000birds.com/intersex-mallard-vancouver.htm with its mostly-male-looking plumage but female-like beak, but it's not quite the same, being closer to typical male Mallard. It also had a "dumpy", short-necked look compared to the other Mallards present.
(Apologies for not knowing how to make links into proper hyperlinks on this forum...)
Hi, new poster here, new to Manchester and reasonably newly (last couple of years) returned to birding (after a YOC childhood then disinterested teens and early 20s).
One of my interests is "genetically unusual" birds/animals - hybrids, odd plumage variations, etc. Ducks and geese seem particularly prone to these, although of course examples can be seen in many other bird species (eg. white or piebald Carrion Crows and Blackbirds, etc) - so i thought i'd start this thread for sightings of hybrid, albinistic/leucistic/melanistic/etc, and otherwise "out of the ordinary" birds.
The 3 most interesting ones i've seen since being in Manchester have all been at Chorlton Water Park, and i've managed to get photos of all of them, so posting them here to see what people think...
First is a very odd, small hybrid goose, which i've now seen at Chorlton WP 3 times - on 6th March, 7th March and 28th March. It's very tame and usually found hanging around the feeding area with Mallards and Canada Geese (although the Canadas don't seem to like it much, and bully it somewhat). From its colouration it's fairly obviously a Branta x Anser hybrid, and i would guess Barnacle for the Branta parent from the small size and mostly-white face, but i've got no idea what the other parent is - i've looked through a hell of a lot of hybrid goose photos on the internet, but failed to find anything particularly like it! (I think the closest was a Barnacle x Emperor goose, but that seems unlikely... although aspects of it call to mind anything from blue-phase Snow to Bar-headed...)
I've got lots of photos of it, but here are some of the best ones: http://pic.atpic.com/1727206/600 http://pic.atpic.com/1727207/600 (with Canadas on land - the hybrid's closer to the camera and the size difference greater than it looks) http://pic.atpic.com/1727233/600 http://pic.atpic.com/1755056/600 http://pic.atpic.com/1755058/600 http://pic.atpic.com/1755059/600 http://pic.atpic.com/1755060/600 (with Mallard - probably the best pic for size comparison - it's about the size of a typical Barnacle Goose)
