FLORIDA JAY. 
61 
found also in Louisiana, and in the West extends northward to 
Kentucky; but along the Atlantic, not so far. In East Florida 
it is more abundant, being found at all seasons in low thick 
covers, clumps, or bushes. They are most easily discovered in 
the morning about sun-rise on the tops of young live-oaks, in 
the close thickets of which they are found in numbers. Their 
notes are greatly varied, and in sound have much resemblance to 
those of the Thrush and the Blue Jay, partaking a little of both: 
later in the day it is more difficult to find them, as they are more 
silent, and not so much on the tree-tops as among the bushes, 
which are too thickly interwoven with briars and saw-palmettos 
to he traversed; and unless the birds are killed on the spot, 
which they seldom are when struck with fine shot, it is next to 
impossible to come at them in such situations. This species, 
like its relatives, is omnivorous, but being inferior in strength, 
does not attack large animals. The stomachs of our specimens 
contained small fragments of shells, sand, and half-digested 
seeds. 
The Blue Jays, though also found in the same localities, are 
not so numerous: they keep more in the woods, and their note is 
louder. 
The Florida Jay is eleven and a half inches long, and nearly 
fourteen in extent; the bill is one inch and a quarter long, 
hardly notched, and of a black colour, lighter at tip; the 
incumbent setaceous feathers of the base are grayish blue, 
mixed with a few blackish bristles; the irides are hazel brown; 
the head and neck above, and on the sides, together with the 
wings and tail, are bright azure; the front, and a line over the 
eye, bluish white; the lores and cheeks of a duller blue, somewhat 
mixed with black; the back is yellowish brown, somewhat mixed 
with blue on the rump, the upper tail-coverts being bright azure; 
the inner vanes and tips of the quills are dusky, their shafts, as 
VOL. II.—Q 
