Saturday, December 15, 2012

Western Scrub-jay

Western Scrub-jay
The western scrub-jay is a non-migratory bird that lives in the western United States and Mexico. There are three subspecies of western scrub-jays, California, Woodhouse's, and Sumichrast's. The California subspecies lives allow the west coast. They usually have a thicker beak which is good for breaking up acorns. The Woodhouse's subspecies is found in the western interior of the US and northern Mexico while the Sumichrast's subspecies is found in the mountains of southern Mexico. These two subspecies have thinner beaks which help to get to the pine nuts inside of pine cones. The bird pictured above was photographed in Colorado which would make it a Woodhouse's western scrub-jay. All of the western scrub-jay's are very smart. They are a member of the Corvidae family which has some of the smartest birds on the planet. They plan for the future by caching food and can remember the locations of many different cache locations. They also are good at finding and stealing from the caches of other birds.



3 comments:

Kerri Farley said...

He's a beauty!

Pat said...

Nice shot!

Misty DawnS said...

They're pretty. Are they similar to our Blue Jays here?