« THE CANADA JAY. 387 



slate black, about the color of a Catbird, and my guide informed me that he 

 saw the young- flying- about a.s early as April 10." 



A corresi)ondent of "The American Field" (in Vol. 34, July 1*1, LSflO, p. 

 54), under the nom de plume of "Agamak," writes about the Canada Jay as 

 follows: "He will eat anything from soap to plug tobacco. His appetite and 

 capacity to stow away food is beyond belief. One day we had a dozen lar<>-e 

 salmon trout hung uj) to dry, but being absent from camp for a few hours we 

 returned to find four Whisk}' Jacks had totally annihilated our fish. They would 

 fly off with pieces half as large as themselves and in a few minutes return for 

 more. It is not possible they could have eaten it all. I have fed them small 

 bits till they could hardly fly enough to get in a tree. ( )ur i)ork, soap, tobacco, 

 and other provisions were unsafe in their sight and reach. Our Indians used to 

 say: 'Him eat moccasins, fur cap, matches, anytink.' I once snared two of 

 them and i)Ut them in a, cage made of birch Ijark and tamarack roots. Half an 

 hour after their ca[)ture they would eat greedily from my hand. He is well 

 named 'Whisky Jack,' as I never saw a more insane, drunken-acting creature 

 in my life." 



The apparent absence of all fear of man, its extreme familiarity, and the 

 many cunning and amusing traits of our Canada Jay must certainly commend 

 him to any lover of nature and go far toward ])alanciug accounts for the damao-e 

 he sometimes does through theft, while his absence from the silent pine, fir, and 

 spruce forests and tamarack swamps in which he makes his home would cer- 

 tainly be felt, and by none more than the hardy trapper or hunter, whose oidy 

 companion he is on many lonely tramps through the deep winter snows, where 

 for days at a time not another living creature is seen. 



Mr. E. A. Samuels, in his Birds of New England (p. 367), says: "I have 

 had numerous opportunities for observing its habits, and I can positi^■el3' affirm 

 that it is equally rapacious and destructive Avitli the Blue Jay, which it resembles 

 in motions and cry. I once knew of a single pair of the birds destroying the 

 young in four nests of the connnon Snowbird (Jiinco ItijemaUs) in a single day." 

 Its flight is slow and laborious, and only accomplished with a great deal of 

 flapping of the wings, while it moves on the ground and in trees with an expert- 

 ness equal to that of our better-known Blue Jay. It utters a number of pecu- 

 liar notes and sounds which are utterly impossible of reproduction on paper. 



The nesting season begins early, long before the snow has disappeared, and 

 therefore comparatively little is yet known about its breeding ha])its. 



Mr. R. MacFarlane found several nests and eggs of the Canada Jay near 

 Anderson River Fort, British North America, during the first week in May, and 

 reports them tolerably numerous in tlie wooded country, even to its northern 

 and eastern limits; but none were observed by liiui in the barrens west or east 

 of Horton River, nor on the Arctic coast. The nests found by him were placed 

 in spruce or tamarack trees, often in the middle of a swamp, on branches, close 

 to the trunks, and well concealed from view, and at heights of 9 or 10 feet. 



The Canada Jay, like the other mendjers of this family, is silent and 

 retiring during the l)reeding season, and is then seldom seen or heard. In the 



