Blue Jays and Black Bears

This morning, a very loud family of 5 Blue Jays came to help themselves to the bird feeders near Sammy's aviary.  The fledglings wing quivered, shook and cawed/screamed incredibly loud chasing their parent(s) branch to branch for handouts.  I don't think Sammy likes Blue Jays very much, he seemed to look nervous and sat very still while intently watching them. Either that, or he just thought they were loud and annoying, disturbing his sunny, quiet morning.  One of them landed on top of his aviary and peered inside, which made Sammy promptly fly to one of his sheltered perches to "hide".  Our other small songbirds fly away when a Blue Jay comes in, so it's good that he seems to know he should fly away and take cover.  As far as I know, they don't harm or attack other birds, although they have been known to occassionally steal and eat other songbird eggs and even nestlings.

A few times today, I've seen Sammy feeding himself mealworms from his dish, although he continues to beg and wing quiver to be fed, like a typical fledgling.  He's also been spending some time on the ground pecking and eating ants and who knows what else.  How he can see those tiny little brown ants from up on his perch is beyond me, amazing eyesight he has.  He also successfully hunted a cricket he spied on the grass.  He still likes to land me on often, I guess he thinks I'm another one of his perches.

Here he is checking out his cedar branches.

We had a black bear in the backyard this evening, just strolling along a few feet from the back porch. We are in bear country and ususally see one a couple times at least every spring and summer.  This past spring, the bear pulled down my bird feeder pole and ate all the seeds.  My own fault for forgetting to bring them in for the night, something we have to do in every season except winter.  The bears wake up hungry in the spring, and bird feeders are such an easy meal for them.

Today, Sammy is 30-31 days old.