Adult Brown Thrasher With A Slight Bill Deformity

I was excited when an adult Brown Thrasher showed up yesterday and began moving toward me. I was already zoomed back a bit for the first few photos of the bird.

Brown Thrasher with a slight bill deformity – Canon R7, f8, 1/320, ISO 800, -0.3 EV, Canon 100-400mm at 330mm, natural light

But the thrashers have been especially skittish this spring and summer, so I took a few images before zooming out to 400mm.

What I didn’t notice at the time was that the thrasher had a slightly deformed bill. I was paying attention to and focused on the thrasher’s movement.

Brown Thrasher with a slight bill deformity – Inset – Canon R7, f8, 1/320, ISO 800, -0.3 EV, Canon 100-400mm at 330mm, natural light

In the inset shown above, the top of the bill is slightly longer than it should be and has crossed over to the left side of the lower part of the bill. The top part of the thrasher’s bill should be centered on the lower part.

This certainly isn’t the worst deformed bill I have ever seen, but it is deformed.

The worst bill deformity I’ve ever seen was on a Red-tailed Hawk I found with a severe case of long-billed syndrome near Grantsville, Utah. That hawk’s bill was so deformed that it probably didn’t live much longer. I spoke to and confirmed with Bud Anderson, an expert on this syndrome in birds, that nothing could be done for the hawk.

The Red-tailed Hawk’s bill was horribly deformed. You can read more about that hawk and Bud Anderson’s thoughts, along with his assessment of the condition from evaluating my photos, here. My sighting of this hawk and the resulting images were the first confirmed raptor case of long-billed syndrome in Utah, as far as Bud knew.

Foraging adult Brown Thrasher in Arkansas – Canon R7, f8, 1/320, ISO 800, -0.3 EV, Canon 100-400mm at 400mm, natural light

This Brown Thrasher looks and acted very healthy while I photographed them foraging. I know it will continue to survive and thrive despite the slightly deformed bill. Other birds with more deformed bills have.

Life is good.

Mia

Check here to see more of my Brown Thrasher photos plus facts and information about this species.