Last year we had a bald Blue Jay and this is one of many articles I had found regarding this occurrence: _http://www.birdersworld.com/brd/default.aspx?c=a&id=512_ (http://www.birdersworld.com/brd/default.aspx?c=a&id=512) (taken from above link) We've heard from many people who have seen bald birds lately. Naturally they wonder, "Why is that bird bald?" The short answer is no one knows why it's bald, but we see this strange sight every summer, mostly in Northern Cardinals and Blue Jays. Of course, we can speculate...
Birds molt their feathers throughout the year, and one possible explanation for baldness is that an abnormal molt occurs on some birds, causing them to lose all of their head feathers at once. The birds may be juveniles undergoing their first prebasic molt. It's also possible that feather mites or lice may cause baldness. The condition has not been studied closely, but fortunately, new feathers grow in within a few weeks. The _Cornell Lab of Ornithology_ (http://www.birds.cornell.edu/pfw/AboutBirdsandFeeding/BaldBirds.htm) has more photos of bald cardinals, as well as Blue Jays. The _Buffalo News published an article_ (http://www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~insrisg/nature/nw98/baldbirds.html) on bald birds in 1998. Be sure to check out Bill Hilton's _article and amazing up-close photos_ (http://www.hiltonpond.org/ThisWeek030701.html) of a bald cardinal. And, finally, here is Syracuse, New York, bird columnist _Ben Burtt's take on bald birds_ (http://web.syr.edu/~bpburtt/Birds/Feb22-04.htm) . In a message dated 6/20/2008 3:21:43 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time, pjwuebker at hughes.net writes: I was out birding yesterday and came across a bald northern cardinal. I've never seen such a thing. Kind of gross, but he had no idea he was not so beautiful and was just singing away. Does anyone have an idea of what happened to this bird? Was he born this way, have some mites or disease? Will he get better? I have posted an image on my web site in the INSTANTS OF NATURE gallery. If you want to see, the address is: _http://photographyontheweb.ifp3.com/_ (http://photographyontheweb.ifp3.com/) PETER WUEBKER _pjwuebker at hughes.net_ (mailto:pjwuebker at hughes.net) = _______________________________________________ Mich-chat mailing list Mich-chat at envirolink.org You can unsubscribe or change your options at: http://lists.envirolink.org/mailman/listinfo/mich-chat this message was delivered to: KSlager at aol.com **************Gas prices getting you down? Search AOL Autos for fuel-efficient used cars. (http://autos.aol.com/used?ncid=aolaut00050000000007) -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://moumn.org/pipermail/mou-net_moumn.org/attachments/20080620/af6557f8/attachment.html
