156 BLUE JAY 



is not as black as he has been painted. Cats do 

 much more harm than Jays in this respect ; but 

 we do not even license our cats, much less shoot 

 our vagrants. In summing uj) the Jay's economic 

 status, it is seen that he does little harm to agri- 

 culture, since all but a small part of the corn he 

 eats is taken in winter, and is only waste grain, 

 while he more than makes u^ for this by the large 

 quantity of insects of which he rids us. He is 

 particularly fond of the spliynx moth family, not- 

 ably the member that is destructive to grapes. 



Mrs. Olive Thorne Miller has always befriended 

 the abused Jay, and in ' A Bird-Lover in the 

 West' gives some delightful chapters on a nest 

 that she watched. This was in the top of a pine- 

 tree, though the birds build ordinarily lower. In 

 Ohio Mr. H. C. Oberholser has found the nests 

 in thorny bushes. The eggs are olive or brown- 

 ish, thickly marked with brown spots. 



The Jay's power as a mimic is well known, and 

 mice may well tremble at his hawk-like cries. 



The Jay belongs to the family of Crows and 

 Jays, and has the powerful bill and feet of the 

 family. ( See Figs. 135 and 136, p. 218.) He 

 uses his feet as the Crow does — to hold his food 

 while he hammers it with his bill. 



Like the Crows, the Jays are social birds, and 

 live in flocks when not nesting. An extreme and 

 most remarkable instance of their devotion to 

 each other is given in ' The Auk ' by Mr. Frithof 



