Kay,

Interesting bird. Western Tanager males get their red color entirely from
rhodoxanthin as opposed to other species which get red from a variety of
carotenoids.

http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/z91-325

Rhodoxanthin is acquired directly from plant food and has been attributed
as the cause for unusual red coloration in the Baltimore Oriole, Cedar
Waxwing and other species.

http://www.bioone.org/doi/abs/10.1676/11-161.1

On Tue, 6 Sep 2016 15:45:36 -0700, "Kay Loughman kayloughman@...
[EBB_Sightings]" <EBB_Sightings-noreply@yahoogroups.com> wrote:

>An unusual tanager spent two minutes (only) visiting one of the
>coffeeberry plants in our yard today. I was set to call it Western
>male, first fall, until I looked more closely at the photos I took. The
>things I noticed were that the orangish feathers were scattered well
>down the chest and onto the belly, flanks and upper tail coverts. Also,
>the upper wing bar was decidedly orange. I know tanagers can vary quite
>a bit in their coloration, but this is outside my experience.
>
><http://www.nhwildlife.net/album/New/slides/WETA-1832c-72.html>
><http://www.nhwildlife.net/album/New/slides/WETA-1835c-72.html>
>
>This part of my north-facing hillside property barely gets any sun after
>mid-August, so the photos are shadier than I'd like. (The upside is that
>it takes the coffeeberries longer to ripen, so they're often available
>to the birds later than plants in sunnier parts of the yard.)
>
>Comments appreciated.
>
>Kay Loughman
>in the hills on the Berkeley/Oakland border
>
>
>
--
Joseph Morlan, Pacifica, CA