The Blue Jay 
3 
I 
j:he most trivial evidence, but every time it is repeated it gains in strength 
uul is soon magnified into huge proportions; and what might liave been easily 
isxplained at the outset, by a careful examination into the facts, casts a life- 
long slur on the character of an innocent victim. Even so careful and exact 
a writer as the late Major Bendire is compelled to add, from his strict sense 
of justice, that he had ” never caught a Blue Jay in mischief.” The writer’s 
experience with this bird is exactly parallel with that of Major Bendire, and 
he is therefore loth to believe all the bad stories that have been printed about 
the noisy, handsome Jay. In every village there is some boy who is not bad 
at heart, but is so full of animal spirits and life that whenever an act of 
harmless mischief is perpetrated it is immediately charged to him. This is 
very much the case with the Jay, "whose obtrusive actions attract attention 
when other birds, equally abundant, remain unnoticed.” 
Probably the most accurate brief respecting the Blue Jay’s feeding 
habits that has ever been written is by Mr. F. E. L. Beal.* A few extracts 
will show that much that has been written will not bear the scrutiny of 
exact scientific research. After citing three cases of field observers who saw 
Blue Jays in the act of sucking eggs or taking young birds, Mr. Beal adds: 
’'In view of such explicit testimony from observers whose accuracy cannot 
be impeached, special pains have been taken to ascertain how far the charges 
were sustained by a study of the bird’s food. An examination was made of 
292 stomachs collected in every month of the year, from 22 states, the dis- 
trict of Columbia, and Canada. The real food is composed of 24.3 per 
j cent of animal matter and 75.7 per cent of vegetable matter. The animal 
food is chiefly made up of insects, with a few spiders, myriapods, snails and 
I small vertebrates, such as fish, salamanders, tree-frogs, mice and birds. 
Everything was carefully examined which might by any possibility indicate 
that birds or eggs had been eaten, but remains of birds were found only in 
two, and the shells of small bird’s eggs in three of the 292 stomachs. One 
of these, taken on February 10, contained the bones, claws and a little 
skin of a bird’s foot. Another, taken on June 24, contained remains of a 
young bird. The three stomachs with birds’ eggs were collected in June, 
August and October. The shell eaten in October belonged to the egg of 
some larger bird like the Ruffed Grouse, and, considering the time of the 
year, was undoubtedly merely an empty shell frorn an old nest. Shells of 
eggs which were identified as those of domestic fowls, or some bird of equal 
size, were found in ii stomachs collected at irregular times during the year. 
This evidence would seem to show that more eggs of domestic fowls than 
of wild birds are destroyed, but it is much more probable that these shells 
were obtained from refuse heaps about farmhouses.! 
To reconcile such contradictory evidence is certainly difficult, but it 
*The Blue Jay and its Food. By F. E. L. Beal. Assistant Biologist. United States Department of Agriculture. 
(A valuable and interesting pamphlet for free distribution.) 
t The writer knows of a case where Blue jays are frequent visitors to a garbage vessel close by a kitchen door, 
even in summer, when other food is abundant. 
