This appears to be a rather mottled crow - I have never seen one like it before - is it a rare form - or do I just not look in the right places.
Apologies for the image quality - it was taken at some distance by my daughter with a mobile phone.
Cheers,
Geoff
what on earth?!, i think it thinks it's a magpie...
It's a pied mutation, quite rare.. looks like a corvid, if so species identification will be down to location and call, though the bill kinda looks like a currawong sp.
I hadn't thought of a currawong, but reportedly it sounded like a crow and was calling to a regular black crow in a tree nearby. Beak doesn't look right for a magpie. Daughter says it looked like a fairly young bird with bits of down, which you can sort of make out in the image.
A different angle image attached.
I read an article about white crows not long ago, but of course can't find the reference now. Apparently they throw white offspring from time to time but they are killed/eaten by parents because they are different. If they do survive they become loners never mixing with the rest and never breeding. They are white not albino. The article was talking about crows/corvids in Europe I think but it may apply here as this is second identification request on white crows I have seen in past few months.
An answer from the Museum of Victoria.
Thank you for contacting the Discovery Centre at Melbourne Museum with your enquiry, which was forwarded to me as the Discovery Centre's ornithology specialist. I've examined the photo you sent us, and conferred with staff from the Museum's ornithology section, and it's our shared opinion that the bird in the image is a partially leucistic Raven. While we aren't sure from your enquiry where you are located, it's worth noting that true Crows are absent from much of Victoria (except the extreme north-west of the state), the vast majority of the birds commonly referred to as Crows here in Victoria are actually Ravens, and can be one of the two common species found in the Melbourne region, the Little Raven Corvus mellori or the Australian Raven Corvus coronoides. As well as being partially lecistic (a genetic condition that affects the expression of pigments of the feathers, making the animal 'pied' or 'piebald'), the animal appears to be a juvenile as you note, due to the fluffy feathers. It isn't realy possible to determine which of the two possible species this one is due to a combination of the leucism, juvenile development and absence of audio (the species can be differentiated on the basis of subtle differences in the call).
For more information on partial leucism (a distinct genetic condition unrelated to albinism),you may be interested in the information here<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leucism>.