Fox squirrel - why?

[mn shutterbug]

I'm not looking for critique as much as I'm looking for an answer as to why my squirrel has a blueish tint where his head appears to meet the tree. Is it just because it's out of focus there and the white balance is responsible? I shot this on a totally overcast day. I am also enclosing a cropped shot of just his head so it's easier for you to see what I'm talking about.

Thanks

[polarbeardiggers]

i would have to agree with your assumption by his feet also has the same blueish tint,

[Sebastian]

Looks like some really poor image processing going on, as if way too much noise reduction was applied. When you have areas of variation in color, noise reduction will tend to smooth it out and result in a "painted" look, which is very apparent here.

What camera was this shot with and at what ISO?

[GB1]

I don't know, but I do like the expression and angle of the squirrel.

[mn shutterbug]

My camera is a Panasonic DMC-FZ7 and I had the noise reduction set to high. I was shooting at ISO 200. I'll change the Noise reduction to standard and see if that makes a difference. I was able to eliminate the blue hue. However, notice the bright white spot in the tail? That's kind of weird too. I took another shot of the same thing just a couple seconds later and it too has the white spot on the tail. But another shot from about 2 minutes before, does not have a white spot anywhere. Strange. Here is the first shot after a little PP and here is the same squirrel shot a couple minutes earlier with the blue hue removed. Now I'll just have to take my peanuts back outside to he comes back for another photo session.