Hello all, noobie here. I joined this board because I thought you folks might be interested in some photos of an albino buzzard we saw yesterday. We live on a mountain in South-Central Pennsylvania (Jacks Mountain), about 10 miles SW of Gettysburg, and we see buzzards every time we look out the windows. They perch on the rocks around our house and roost in nearby trees & rock outcrops.
In the 6 years we've lived here, we've seen lots of normally-colored turkey vultures and black vultures, but we have never seen a white buzzard until yesterday. The albino looks more like a black vulture than a turkey vulture to me, but it's hard to tell them apart from a distance. It did not have a red head like a turkey vulture, but the albinism might have caused it to have a white head. The feathers on top of the wings were pure white, and those on the wing bottom had a slightly greyish cast. I've noticed that the feathers on underside of the wings of normal buzzards are more greyish than the dark black feathers on top of the wings. Anyway, here are 4 of the photos. I'll post another 4 in a follow-up post. Any comments?
Here are 4 more photos of the albino buzzard.
With no plumage details shape is pretty much all there is to go on. Based on this I'd say its a black vulture. For instance, the wings and tail do not look long enough for a turkey vulture, and the wings are very broad.
I cant see the leg length very well in the photos to compare it with the tail, did you notice them being long? ie. reaching the tail tip.
The only unusual thing is that all the photos show the bird to fly with the wings held slightly raised in a v-shape. Black vulture usually carries them flat.
It's certainly an interesting-looking bird. Thanks for posting about it.