There’s a female blackbird outside my window right now - she has a patch of white feathers on the top of her head and various other white flecks in her plumage generally.
Does this ever happen to birds as a result of old age (like grey/silver hair in humans and other mammals), or is it always just the result of mutation, congenital quirks or past injuries?
Just a brief addendum to note that I do realise old age is something that the majority of small animals simply don’t survive to enjoy, however, there are always statistical outliers, and it’s these I’m asking about.
Yeah, these statistical outliers are called “housepets”. No doubt a Doper with a parrot or cockatiel will be along shortly to answer your query.
I’ve owned a few budgies myself, but none that have really lived to a ripe old age (and anyway, they were all light coloured to begin, so it would be hard to tell .
Two of my lovebirds acquired gray feathers as they achieved old age, so the answer is yes, but neither went all-over gray or entirely lost their color. One of them did start to get bald patches shortly before he died, so that can happen, too.
The age related change I see more often (in pet birds) is hyperkeratosis of the feet. It looks kinda/sorta like a callus.
That is an interesting observation. Back in the 1960s budgie breeding really took off. They are flock breeders, and a person could set up a dozen pairs in a flight cage and make some money selling the offspring to pet stores, Woolworths, and the like.
However, there was an abnormal selection process. Birds that were not good enough to sell were often able to be used as breeders. When you add in the cessation of Australia’s exportation of birds, creating less “new blood” for the gene pool, Mangetout’s observations make sense.
I believe it’s also the case that show breeders would also sell ‘culls’ to pet stores - not that they’re deformed or sickly or anything, but just that they were undersized or didn’t look like they would meet the breed standard.
The aviary from which I bought my current bird has extensive show breeding flocks out the back - and all of the birds there are twice the size of my pet, and it’s not just more fluffy feathers, because they all have enormous feet (although from their coloration, I can tell they’re related - he’s an unusual colour).
That’s not to say that the show standard is necessarily the definition of a genetically healthy bird, of course.
