Scrub Jay Behavior Has Changed...

Last year I was in charge of putting out the peanuts in the shell for the six Scrub Jays that visited our yard every single day. This was back when I scattered the nuts over our patio. Then we had the problem with the possum coming to our yard in the night, and making a mess on the patio of nut dust and bits of shell. We noticed that after the possum started coming into the yard that the number of Scrub Jays coming into our yard during the day, dwindled down to only two. So my husband started putting the nuts into a ‘nut box’, which he put out only in the morning so the possum would not have a reason to come into our yard during the night, and perhaps the possum would move to a different part of the golf course, and leave our birds alone. .

Last week we saw that three jays were now coming into the yard for their nut snacks.

This morning I watched an aggressive Scrub Jay marching back and forth in front of the nut box, as another jay would approach the nut box the marching, militant jay would scream and run after the new bird, chasing it away so it didn’t get any nuts. Now I am beginning to wonder if Scrub Jays bicker among themselves much like humans do when resources become scarce? While my husband puts the same amount of nuts into the box as I used to scatter on the patio, the amount looks like it is less because it is in a box, and not scattered around the patio.

Back last year when we had six jays coming into our yard to scoop up the nuts I had scattered on the patio we all witnessed the behavior where the six jays would play a ‘game of tag’ with each other. As each bird would come into the yard he would screech at the others in the yard letting the other jays know that he was coming in for a landing. I didn’t see any one bird make a serious effort to prevent another bird from getting a nut. Instead I saw 'playful' behavior. The six jays appeared to be a close family of birds yet we know that it consisted of three couples, and each couple would have their own nest in one of the pine trees that are scattered on the golf course.

I would often go out during the day to scatter more nuts on the patio, and when I would do this I would hear the screech of one of the jays letting the other jays know that more nuts were in the yard. I remember the day when the nuts were all eaten, there were no nuts on the patio... that one of the jays landed on a small shelf I have on my house that is just outside of my kitchen window. I was at the sink preparing dinner and looking out the window, and I saw the bird standing on the shelf looking in the house at me. He was only a couple of feet away!.
I realized that he/she was asking me to go out and scatter some peanuts so he/she and friends could have their snack. I will never forget that behavior on the bird’s part that day they ran out of nuts…the bird knew who I was, and he/she knew where I was, and by his/her unusual behavior this bird was able to let me know that all of the nuts on the patio had been eaten.

Back when I was in charge of scattering the nuts; often before I could leave the yard I would have one of these beautiful birds land just a couple of feet away from me scooping up one of the nuts I had just placed on the patio. This happened so often that I came to call any jay that did this behavior, ‘buddy boy’.
Often before I could get through the back door into the garage, the other five jays would be swooping down playing tag and scooping up their nuts.

The behavior I witnessed today, where one bird stops another bird from feeding has me puzzled. What happened to that beautiful blue bird to change its behavior from playful to belligerent? Was it the presence of a possum in the neighborhood threatening his/her safety, or was it something else?


Puzzled MOM in Hollister

This is a true-life story of Carol Garnier Dutra
Copyright © 2010 by Carol Garnier Dutra


UPDATE; Later today I saw a small blackbird, just a plain tiny blackbird, come over to the nut box, and grab a peanut that was almost as big as the little bird's head! One of the jays swooped down from our roof, and tried to stop the blackbird from leaving with the nut, but the little blackbird got away with his/her prize.

I am getting the idea that the strange behavior I saw demonstrated by the jay this morning could be because there are birds other than the jays, and animals too, feeding on the peanuts. 'Buddy Boy' may be feeling that there are just too many visitors to the nut box these days!

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