198 BIRDS OF NEW ENGLAND AND EASTERN NEW YORK 



Blue Jay. 



Gyanocitta cristata 

 11.74 



4(i. — Upper parts grayish-blue ; head furnished with a crest, 

 which is often, however, depressed; wings and tail bright blue, with 

 narrow black bars and broad white spots; throat gray; collar about 

 breast and neck black; lower belly white. 



Nest, placed in thick evergreen from Ave to twenty feet up. 

 Eggs, greenish, spotted with brown. 



The Blue Jay is a common permanent resident of New 

 England and New York, but is most numerous in the au- 

 tumn. It inhabits woodland 

 of any sort, feeding in fall 

 and winter on grain, acorns, 

 and nuts ; in spring and sum- 

 mer it lives largely on in- 

 sects, but too often robs the 

 nests of other birds of eggs 

 or young. Though a noisy 

 bird at times, a pair can be 

 so silent about the nesting- 

 site that the eggs will per- 

 haps be laid before their 

 presence is suspected. Their 

 bright contrast, too, of blue 

 and white, is not nearly so conspicuous in leafy shade as 

 one might expect. Jays have a habit of hopping upward 

 from one branch to the next till they reach the top of a 

 tree. When flying through open spaces, they keep at 

 almost an exact level, and may by this peculiarity of flight 

 be recognized at some distance. Jays are very vigilant and 

 give notice by their screams of the presence of an intruder ; 

 hawks and owls are frequently pursued by a noisy mob. 



Their notes vary greatly ; the commonest are the well- 

 known strident djay djay, a higher and more prolonged 

 tee-ar tee-ar, which exactly simulates the scream of the 



Fig. 60. Blue Jay 



