386 i^IFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS, 



parts of the United States, where it is a resident and breeds. Within our bor- 

 ders it is most common in northern Maine and northern I\Iinnesota, inhaljiting- 

 the extensive pine and tamarack forests foimd there. In the Adirondacks, in 

 northern New York, it occm-s only in the wikler portions, and it is not nnconi- 

 mou in sections of the White and Green Monntaius, in northern New Hampshire 

 and Vermont. It occasionally straggles a little farther south than tlie points 

 mentioned, but such occurrences are rather rare. Northward it ranges through 

 the Dominion of Canada to the western shores of Hudson Bay, to Fort Churchill, 

 and thence throughout the interior of the fur countries to the limit of timber 

 within the Arctic Circle, east of the Rocky Mountains. 



No bird is better known to the lumbermen, trappers, and hunters along our 

 northern bordei than the Canada Jay, whicli is a constant attendant at their 

 camps, and affords them no little amusement during the lonely hours spent in the 

 woods. To one not familiar with these birds it is astonishing how tame they 

 become. 



Mr. Manly Hardy writes: " The Canada Jay is a constant resident of north- 

 ern Maine, but in some seasons they are far more abundant than in others, 

 being usually found in companies of from three to ten. They are the boldest 

 of all our birds, except the Chickadee (Farm atricajnUus), and in cool impu- 

 dence far surpass all others. They will enter tents, and often alight on the bow 

 of a canoe where the paddle at every stroke comes within 18 inches of them. 

 I know of nothing which can be eaten that they will not take, and I had one 

 steal all my candles, pulling them out endwise one by one from a piece of birch 

 bark they were rolled in, and another pecked a large hole in a cake of castile 

 soap. A duck which I had picked and laid down for a few minutes had the entire 

 breast eaten out by one or more of these birds. I have seen one alight in the 

 middle of my canoe and peck away at the carcass of a beaver I had skinned. 

 They often spoil deer saddles by pecking into them near the kidneys. They do 

 great damage to the trappers by stealing the bait from traps set for martens and 

 minks and by eating trapped game; they will spoil a marten in a short time. 

 They will sit quietly and see you build a log trap and bait it, and then, almost 

 before your back is turned, you hear their hateful 'ca-ca-ca' as they glide down 

 and peer into it. They will work steadily carrying off meat and hiding it. I 

 have tlorown out pieces and watched one to see how nuich he would carry off. 

 He ilew across a wide stream and in a short time looked as bloody as a butcher 

 from carrying large pieces; but his patience held out longer than mine. I 

 think one would work as long as Mark Twain's California Jay did trying to fill 

 a miner's cabin with acorns tlu'ough a knot hole in the roof They eat insects 

 of different kinds, and I have found carrion beetles in their crops; they also eat 

 the fungi or mushrooms growing on stumps, usuig these largely when other food 

 is scarce. They are fond of the berries of the mountain ash, and, in fact, few 

 things come amiss; and I believe tliey do not possess a single good quality 

 excepting industry. They breed early in March. While on a trip to the famous 

 Ripogenus Falls, in June, 1891, I saw many young Canada Jays; these were 



