Exotic game bird spotted in Calgary

There's an unusual bird strolling around northwest Calgary right now.

Mike McLean got a glimpse of it during a Sunday drive through Sandstone, the community just northeast of Nose Hill Park.

"There was an elderly lady standing on the side of the street with the dog and the dog was pointing, like he was fixed on something," said McLean.

"So I looked across the street and there was this bizarre-looking, beautiful bird that I had never seen before."

He snapped several photos of the game bird, which he described as "fat" and about "the size of a football."

"He reminded me of the penguin from the Batman movie."

Red-legged partridge or a chukar?

Initially, McLean thought the bird was a red-legged partridge, which is native to France, Spain and northwest Italy.

But two Alberta bird experts who have seen McLean's photographs say it's more likely a chukar (also known as a chukar partridge), which is the national bird of Iraq and Pakistan.

Calgary birder Gus Yaki said chukars were unsuccessfully introduced to Alberta as game birds in the 1920s, but have done "quite well" in the Okanagan Valley — which still has a well established population.

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Chris Fisher, author of Birds of Alberta, said many acreage owners in and around the city keep chukars and other exotic birds.

"This is a bird that should be acknowledged because it actually broke free of its pen, wherever it was located in the Calgary area… and is having quite a summer for itself."

With files from the CBC's Falice Chin and the Calgary Eyeopener