Crossbill or deformed bird. Thousand Oaks, CA, USA (1 Viewer)

bobfranks

Member

• Feb 5, 2008

• #1

Hi Everyone,
The two attached photos are of bird I thought was a female red crossbill. They are both posted to my Flickr page and someone left a comment saying that it was probably a deformity and looked like a kingbird instead. The photos were taken in September of '06. Does anyone here know what it is?
Thanks,
Bob

 

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Joern Lehmhus

Well-known member

• Feb 5, 2008

• #2

bobfranks said:

Hi Everyone,
The two attached photos are of bird I thought was a female red crossbill. They are both posted to my Flickr page and someone left a comment saying that it was probably a deformity and looked like a kingbird instead. The photos were taken in September of '06. Does anyone here know what it is?
Thanks,
Bob

Click to expand...

definitely not a crossbill (For a start, female x-bills are differentely coloured, more greenish and shorter tailed....), but Kingbird looks a good possibility

 

Natalie

Learning Birder

• Feb 5, 2008

• #3

...Almost looks like it survived a nasty attack to the head.

 

G

goshawk227

Diehard Massachusetts Birder

• Feb 5, 2008

• #4

It's a Western Kingbird with a gross bill deformity. Looks like there was damage to the base up the upper mandible, and it swelled up, halting growth, which let the lower mandible grow unchecked. But still notice the faint yellow belly, and black tail with white sides.