Sulphur-crested Cockatoos Colouration

Hi All, 

Here's a list of replies i got to my
initial posting...i'm still unconvinced about this colouration:

Sender        
                     
      Sighting Location          
                     
         Suggested Cause 

Peter Fuller(myself)      
                    Fyansford,
Geelong, VIC                  
                     
      Wanted to stand out in a crowd
Jill Dark        
                     
                  Cairns/Atherton
Tablelands,QLD                
              Feeding on Red Soil 
Philip Veerman      
                     
      No sighting            
                     
                     
                Wood pulp from
nest excavating ( educated guess)
John Reidy        
                     
            Leeton, NSW      
                     
                     
                 Bathing
in puddle of very muddy red water (visibly muddy)
Duncan Fraser        
                     
     Gippsland, VIC            
                     
                     
        ??????????????????        
                     
         
Annabel Ashworth/Hoskins    
       Tamworth, NSW          
                     
                     
        Molasses from
farmers feed supplement blocks turning feathers pink.
Alan Gillanders            
             Atherton Tablelands, QLD
                     
         Staining
from red, tropical soils.
Jack Shapiro        
                     Mosman,
NSW


Heres some images of the bird i saw down
at Fyansford:

http://www.boogey.org/~peter/SCC/PinkSCC.html

Please let me know if you have troubles accessing
this link.

Cheers, 

Peter

 





On Thursday  ( 23/10/03) while walking
at Balmoral Beach (Mosman, NSW), I observed a group of 4 Sulphur-crested
Cockatoos feeding on grass roots on the lawn.  One of them was had
a light brown colouration to most of it feathers except the head.  In
bright sunlight it looked brown, but perhaps under lesser bright conditions
it may be viewed as "pinkish".  The bird itself looked exactly
like the other cockatoos in its features, not like a hybrid.  I have
seen hybrid of Sulphur-crested Cockatoos and Galahs, and this was not one
of them. The bird didn¹t look dirty, but at the interface between the coloured
and white regions of the plumage , the colouration didn¹t look natural.
 This may well be an example of what Peter Fuller suggested a phenomenon
related to nesting.   

Recently there has been correspondence on this type of observation in birding
Aus, with Peter Fuller initiating the subject (Peter Fuller ; [BIRDING-AUS]
Sulphur-crested Cockatoos colouration- 27, 28,29 August 2003).

What is curious is that such colouration has only been reported this year,
and on other  different individuals of this species, at very diverse
locations.  Could the dry weather this year be responsible in so indirect
way ?

Jack Shapiro