I've taken this photo 3 years ago at Bombay Hook NWR in Delaware. It was taken with a Nikon D500/500mm lens at extreme range. It looked like a Red Tail Hawk but it had only white and some black feathers. The attached photo was cropped, sharpened and converted from RAW to Jpeg, but no color manipulation occurred.
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Has anyone ever heard of an Albino Red-Tail Hawk? (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter montynj1
- Start date
Thanks for the info! That's the bird I saw at Bombay Hook NWR.
Tired
Well-known member
As far as I'm aware, any animal can be albino or leucistic. If it has some melanin, it's leucistic, not albino. I don't know how to confirm which species of hawk it is, but it definitely looks leucistic- nice find! The feathers look a little tattered, which is common in albino and leucistic animals, as the lack of melanin makes the feathers less durable.
Red-tail hawks are fairly common in the NJ/Northeast area and that's what I thought it was except for the lack of color in its feathers. This was the first time I ever saw a leucistic version of any raptor in the wild. That's an interesting fact about the lack of melanin on the durability of feathers. Thanks for sharing.
mcbridejoba
New member
Very light colored Red-Tails are uncommon but not that unusual. There was a very famous one that lived in Central Park NY called Pale Male. There is even a children's book written about him.
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