 Three Jays After June There is a noticeable lack of smaller birds (such as Chickadees and Nuthatches) at the window feeder of my current house-sit so I decided to cheer the place up by attracting a few larger birds. After rummaging through the freezer I discovered a rendered clump of suet and placed it on the window feeder then I stood back and waited for the large birds to drop by and fill the void left by the smaller birds. Very quickly a female Hairy Woodpecker discovered the prize, flew down and tapped on the suet block. She was a subspecies of Hairy Woodpecker that goes by the name of monticola, a bird typified by a complete lack of white dotting on the upper portion of the wing. I never get this subspecies at my home feeder (about ten miles southwest of here.) The next bird to visit the suet was a sooty looking male Downy Woodpecker. These duskier Downy Woodpeckers are a subspecies found most often on the coast. I recalled that both the Downy and Hairy Woodpeckers I saw one winter in Surrey at Green Timbers Park were all sooty individuals. This sudden activity around the feeder was pleasing; it looked like I would have birds to entertain me after all. Soon a number of Hairy and Downy Woodpeckers made it part of their routine to stop by and hammer at the suet. In addition to the Woodpeckers, a trio of Gray Jays became regular suet visitors. The number three seems very important to the Gray Jays and I have noticed that after June the rule is that no more than three will be seen together – thus three Jays after June. I have no explanation for the three Gray Jay observation, but in a book by Anne Savage I read about another species of Jay, I forget which one, routinely travels in threes. She explains that a mated pair with territory accepts one of their offspring as an understudy. It is usually a male and it spends the winter with the adult birds and in spring will help raise the next brood of Jays. From this I deduced that the same thing probably happens with Gray Jays. So it was no surprise to see three gray jays routinely coming to the feeder. However, one of the members of the Gray Jay group started doing something that was not very routine. The one bird began flying aggressively at the window on each visit. This particular bird seemed a little darker on the breast than the others and as I watched it interact with the other two Jays I noticed that it was often forced to give way as the other Jays swooped in to carry off suet. This suggested that the status of the bird was inferior to the other two and perhaps it was this year’s apprentice. But what would make a bird attack the window? The antics of birds are often mysterious. As watchers we often must use our own reason to try and deduce what the bird is up to so that we can get a glimpse into the mind of a bird. The thinking behind such window attacks is that a bird sees its own reflection and then attempts to drive off the intruding bird just as it would with a real interloper. It does not understand that the other bird is not a bird, even after repeatedly flying into its own reflection; all it knows is that it sees an intruder. At first I did not pay much attention. I thought these antics were isolated incidents as other Gray Jays have gone to the window feeder for years, and never displayed such behaviour. When I realized this bird was planning to attack the window every time the group showed up, I decided something would need to be done. This particular window would need to be dotted. I looked in my art supply case and found some ‘kids paint’ (tempera discs in a tin case.) I have never actually dotted a window at the house-sit location nor had I used tempera disc paints to do a window dotting job. There was ample time to watch the window attacking Jay’s antics, so I decided to dot the window a little at a time until the Jay stopped. The window is composed of two panes; the larger pane is about the same width as the feeder tray and sits to the left of the smaller window pane. The smaller window pane can swing open and closed. The Jay in question likes to sit on the edge of the feeder before flying upwards and meeting the window halfway. After which the Jay gradually flutters from the window midpoint to the top. Upon reaching the top the Gray backs off then attempts another foray. I decided to dot only the portion of the window directly in front of the feeder platform since that’s where the attacks begin. I lean out the window, finger-tips coated with white tempera paint, make a small pattern of dots then wait. On its very next visit the Jay again attacked the window. More dots were needed so I waited until the bird departed and dotted half the window. The jay returned and attacked the top half of the window I hadn’t dotted. Next, I covered the large pane completely with dots leaving only the smaller pane free of white dots. The Jay returned and attacked the undotted small pane. Between battles the jay clung to the frame of the window, or retreated to a twig sticking from the feeder edge. When the Jay finally left I removed the twig and half the smaller windowpane. The Jay returned and attacked the clear portion of the glass. All this attacking and dotting happened over the course of several days until I went outside, stood on a ladder and covered both panes of glass with dots. As I hoped, on its next visit, the Gray Jay completely ignored the window. The window dots finally did their job but I never thought I would have to dot the complete reflective surface. In the past a Yellow-rumped Warbler developed a similar fixation on one of my windows, but I was able to immediately repel its aggressive advances with a sparse sprinkling of dots. Perhaps Jays, with their superior intelligence and perhaps an increased ability to remember and focus, require more effort to deter. Thankfully things have settled down to a quiet rhythm around the feeder; Woodpecker and Jays visit without incident but the Chickadees and Nuthatches are still playing hard to get. Birds are funny. To e-mail Tom CLICK HERE To look at previous column CLICK HERE |
