Disruptive Coloration

Some would say that chickadees are marked that way to maximize cuteness.  However, the functional significance of this type of coloration serves to disrupt the outline and literally provide these scrappy birds with an invisibility cloak that makes them less detectable to a predator's eye.  Not quite an artsy type of photo, but shows the coloration at work keeping this bird safe while out in the open among the branches near our bird feeders. K5 IIs 600mm f5.6 (1/200sec at f11, ISO 500) crop, levels, Topaz Detail, Some extra sticks were removed with the rubber stamp tool.