BirdForum is the net's largest birding community dedicated to wild birds and birding, and is absolutely FREE!

Register for an account to take part in lively discussions in the forum, post your pictures in the gallery and more.

Reply to thread

Message: <blockquote data-quote="Muratfaik" data-source="post: 3481755" data-attributes="member: 84277">Hi Bryon, Some taxonomists consider the pine bunting and Yellowhammer as same species. In that case Emberiza leucocephalos fronto (Stresemann, 1930) and Emberiza leucocephalos leucocephalos (S. G. Gmelin, 1771) are two subspecies of the pine bunting. In Urals and Western Sibiria these two species breed together next to one an other. But hybridisation is very limited. In these hybrids, the white parts are sooty yellow. So, in our case, it is quite a low possibility. But the yellowhammer's pale morphs are not considered here yet. One indication that does not support hybridisation between pine bunting and yellowhammer, is the light areas on the crown of the bird. As far as I know this can only be in the case of hybridisation of yellowhammer and cirl bunting, but in that case there would be many criteria exposed which does not fit to this bird. I am a bit experienced about the crown feather genetic behaviour of these chickens which are comparable with passerine crown genetics: polish, barbu watermael, kosova longcrowler, appenzeller spitzhauben, sultan, brabanter, brabançonne etc. All behaves different genetically, but all comes from a mutation in Tirol mountains  in middle ages. I think before IDing the bird, we have to look at subspecies-superspecies descriptions and ranges. Murat F. Özçelik <a href="https://vimeo.com/channels/murat" target="_blank">https://vimeo.com/channels/murat</a></blockquote>

Verification