156 Birds Every Child Should Know 
BLUE JAY 
This vivacious, dashing fellow, harsh- 
voiced and noisy, cannot be overlooked; for 
when a brightly coloured bird, about a foot 
long, roves about your neighbourhood with a 
troop of screaming relatives, everybody knows 
it. In summer he keeps quiet, but throws 
off all restraint in autumn. Hear him ham- 
mering at an acorn some frosty morning! 
How vigorous his motions, how alert and in- 
dependent! His beautiful military blue, black 
and white feathers, and crested head, give him 
distinction. 
He is certainly handsome. But is his beauty 
only skin deep? Does it cover, in reality, a 
multitude of sins? Shocking stories of murder 
in the song bird’s nest have branded the blue 
jay with quite as bad a name as the crow’s. The 
brains of fledgings, it has been said, are his 
favourite tid-bits. But happily scientists, who 
have turned the searchlight on his deeds, find 
that his sins have been very greatly exag- 
gerated. Remains of young birds were found 
in only two out of nearly three hundred blue 
jays’ stomachs analysed. Birds’ eggs are more 
apt to be sucked by both jays and squirrels 
than are the nestlings to be eaten. Do you 
ever enjoy an egg for breakfast? Fruit, grain, 
thin-shelled nuts, and the larger’ seeds of trees 
