OREGON JAY 27 



Charles E. Doe collection, taken by J. C. Braly near Sandy, Oreg., April 

 20, 1932. It was about 30 feet from the ground close to the trunk of a 

 small fir in a fir grove. 



Eggs. — Major Bendire (1895) describes the eggs as "pearl gray or 

 light greenish gray in ground color, spotted and flecked with smoke and 

 lavender gray, and these markni^s are prettv evenly distributed over 

 the entire tgg. In shape they are ovate; the shell is smooth, close 

 grained, and only moderately glossy." 



Mr. Doe (MS.) describes his eggs as "ground color dark gray, boldly 

 marked with almost black and a few lavender marks — very striking eggs." 



The measurements of 21 eggs average 27.0 by 20.6 millimeters ; the 

 eggs showing the four extremes measure 29.7 by 21.6, 27.6 by 21.8, 

 and 25.4 by 19.3 millimeters. 



Plumages. — Ridgway (1904) describes the young bird in juvenal 

 plumage as follows : "Entire pileum and hindneck dull sooty brown or 

 grayish sepia, the feathers narrowly and indistinctly margined with 

 paler ; no whitish collar across lower hindneck ; sides of head similar in 

 color to pileum, the auricular region with indistinct dull whitish shaft- 

 streaks ; nasal tufts sepia brown ; chin and anterior portion of malar 

 region dirty brownish white ; throat dull grayish brown, intermixed with 

 dull grayish white ; rest of under parts pale broccoli brown, some of the 

 feathers with indistinct paler shaft-streaks; wings, tail, back, etc., essen- 

 tially as in adults ; bill partly light-colored." 



I have noticed in young birds I have examined that the wing coverts 

 are not tipped with white, as they are in adults. A partial postjuvenal 

 molt, including the contour feathers and wing coverts, but not the rest 

 of the wings and tail, begins early in July and may continue well into 

 September in some individuals ; I have seen one bird that had not quite 

 completed the molt on September 10. The complete postnuptial molt of 

 adults begins early in July and is probably completed in August in 

 most cases. 



Food. — Very little has been published on the food of the Oregon jay, 

 but it is apparently just as omnivorous as other members of the genus 

 Perisoreus. It is a frequent visitor at the camps and feeds freely on 

 anything edible, scraps from the table or any other food that it can beg 

 or steal. Mr. Simpson (1925) v.-rites about the birds around his camp: 



We have tried the birds with all kinds of food and their undoubted favourite 

 is cheese, of which they are passionately fond. ♦ ♦ * 



The birds each had their mornini^ morsel of cheese today. They hold it in 

 their mouths for a long time, turning it over and over with their tongues, as if 

 the taste were most pleasing to them. The cheese is often shifted to the 'pouch' 

 under the cliin and held there for some time. Then it may be deposited carefully 



