HYDERABAD: A rare colour variant of the coppersmith barbet, a commonly seen green bird, has been photographed on the outskirts of Hyderabad, in what birdwatchers believe could be the first documented record of the unusual colour form in Telangana.
Birdwatchers Joydeep Vasudeva and Dhaval Joshi spotted the bird during an early-morning field trip on September 27 in a semi-rural area in north Hyderabad. The bird had uniform cream-yellow plumage instead of the species’ characteristic green body. The observers watched it feeding on wild figs alongside normally coloured barbets.
They said it appeared healthy and active and interacted normally with other birds. Photographs have been uploaded to an eBird checklist, while the exact location has been withheld to avoid disturbing the bird.
The unusual colouring is linked to leucism resulting in xanthochroism, in which reduced melanin causes the blue structural effect in the feathers to disappear, leaving the yellow pigmentation more prominent. The bird is not considered albino as its eyes remained dark, while its red and yellow facial patches were retained.
A 2022 study published in Ornis Hungarica documented five similar Coppersmith Barbets from West Bengal, Assam and Bangladesh. The birds were largely yellowish or whitish, with their carotenoid colours intact.
All five records were from eastern parts of the subcontinent, more than 1,000 km from Hyderabad. The observers said they were unaware of any earlier record of a similar bird in Telangana.