Blue Jay

Blue Jay

Habitat:
The Blue Jay is one of the loudest and most colorful birds of eastern backyards. Intelligent and adaptable, feeding on almost anything, it is quick to take advantage of bird feeders. Blue Jays range from southern Canada, mainly east of the Rockies to the Gulf States. It is mainly a year-round resident.

Diet:
Omniverous. Most of diet is vegetable matter, especially in winter, including acorns, beechnuts and other nuts, many kinds of seeds grain, berries, small fruits, sometimes cultivated fruits. Eats many insectsd, especially caterpillars, beetles, grasshoppers and others. Also eats spiders snails, birds' eggs, sometimes small rodents, forgs, baby birds, carrion and others.
Forages in trees and shrubs and on the ground. Comes to feeders for seeds and suet. Pounds hard seeds or nuts with bill to break them open. Will harvest acorns and store them in holes.

Nesting:
Build nests in trees, placed in a vertical crotch of trunk or at a horizontal fork in a limb welll out from the trunk, usuall 8-30' about the ground. Nest, built by both sexes, is a bulky open cup made of twigs, grass, weeds, barkstrips, moss, sometimes held together by mud. Nest is lined with rootlets and other fine materials, often decorated with paper, rags, string or other debris.

Eggs:
4-5 eggs, sometimes 3-7, greenish buff, sometimes pale blue, spotted with brown and gray.

Young:
Incubation is by both parents (but female does most), about 16-18 days. Both parents bring food for nestlings. Young leave 17-21 days after hatching.
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