Blue jay feast

The blue jays are often the first ones at the feeders these days. Most particularly they fancy the easy to get seeds on the rail and I see four to six of them lined up storing seeds in their gullet and flying off to hide them somewhere.

I believe they are from a family of blue jays that nested in the blue spruce that is highlighted by the early morning sun behind the feeder. It hangs over the drive shed and is the nursery for many young families of birds - finches - gold, purple and house, chickadees and hummingbirds most particularly. But the jays have been living there too - though not recently.

Until about two weeks ago the youngest jays were still fluttering their wings and mewing at the adults to feed them. Comical to see those big fat babies badgering their bedraggled and much thinner parents, begging as if they are starving. Parents often start giving them short shrift as they get bigger and fatter, insisting that they learn to take care of themselves. But there is often one, that won't leave the nest. Sort of like some human youngsters we all hear about, don't you think?

The natural world does include us with all our foibles. It's fun to compare and I often chuckle about how easy it is to forget we are Nature's creature's too.

Enjoy this beautiful day as we run up to Hallowe'en - one of the several pagan festivals that has been adopted by other religions and transformed to meet their codes. Will you be celebrating Hallowe'en this year? The blue jays will certainly be looking for treats - but then every day is a day to look for treats for them.