Finally captured my holy grail! This extraordinarily rare yellow cardinal lives in a natural area that is literally 5 minutes from my old apartment and it took me MONTHS to finally get a good look at him, like one week before I moved out. I was out searching for this handsome bastard nearly every weekend, driving myself mad trying to get a photo of him, until finally he deigned to flit down right in front of me and pose AND he let me excitedly call over some nearby kids to share in the moment before he flew off. Couldn’t stop smiling.
This one-in-a-million mutation (called xanthochromism) occurs when the male cardinal lacks an enzyme responsible for converting yellow pigments in their food into the typical red of their feathers. I am a bit obsessed with the genetics of color and pattern mutations in wildlife and finally seeing this little dude up close was worth the wait.
