One loud bird

The steel-cold shriek that spooks me during my weekend walk is something I’ve always associated with the blue jay – one of the loudest and brightest winter birds in St. Albert.

But careful observers know that blue jays do more than eat peanuts and scream bloody murder – they also take ant baths.

Blue jays are robin-sized birds with a crest on their head, a white chest and bright blue wings, says Jocelyn Hudon, curator of ornithology at the Royal Alberta Museum.

“It’s one of the very few birds that is blue, and the only one that’s blue and has a crest in most of Alberta.” If you’re near the mountains, you might confuse one with a Steller’s jay, which has a black head.

Blue jays are relatively uncommon in the city, Hudon says, a fact he attributes to the Edmonton region’s lack of nut trees. The birds prefer to use their powerful beaks to hammer open hazelnuts and acorns, which is bad news for Hudon’s hazelnut tree. “Every year, I have to fight with the blue jays before they get (to) it.”

These birds are extremely vocal, says Lu Carbyn, co-owner of Edmonton’s Wildbird General Store, and will really let loose with a warning “Jay! Jay!” if an owl is around.

They’ll also use it to complain about poor service. “They’ve learned that people like them,” Carbyn says, so if they come to a feeder and there’s no food in it, they’ll usually kick up a fuss. “It’s a way of alarming the homeowners that, ‘Hey, we’re hungry. Put out the peanuts.’ ”

Blue jays have also been known to make calls like a squeaky gate, a bell, and, famously, a red-tailed hawk. If you hear a low frequency “murr, murr” coming from the bushes, adds Hudon, you’re in luck: it’s the sound of two blue jays chatting as they build a nest.

Blue jays can also express themselves using their crest, reports Hinterland Who’s Who. They raise it fully to show aggression, point it forward when surprised, bristle it like a paintbrush when frightened, and lay it flat when relaxed.

Their cobalt-blue feathers get their colour from a trick of the light, Hudon explains. Special cavities in the feathers trap and reflect the blue wavelength of light while letting the rest pass through to get absorbed by a layer of black. “The blue colour is a structural colour.” Crush the feather, and the blue disappears.

In the early summer, Carbyn says you may see blue jays missing a lot of feathers due to irritation caused by the mites that often infest their nests.

Some will engage in a strange behaviour called “anting” to get relief from the mites. “They’ll go to an ant mound, they’ll sit on it and they’ll spread their wings,” Carbyn says. The ants, presumably alarmed by the big feathery bottom parked on their home, will crawl all over the bird while spitting formic acid. That acid deters the mites, giving the birds some itch relief.

Observers have spotted the jays tripping over themselves to apply ants to itchy spots, reports Hinterland Who’s Who. Some have also seen them use fruit, mustard and tobacco for similar purposes. Other researchers suggest the ants may give relief to irritation caused not by mites but growing feathers.

Blue jays are pretty easy to attract, Hudon said – just put out shelled peanuts. “A blue jay will chase off every other bird when he’s around,” he notes, so you might want to set up a separate feeder for them.

Carbyn says he likes the colour and song blue jays bring to a neighbourhood. “They brighten up the backyard.”

They are a little arrogant, though, he adds. “If you don’t jump to the pump when they want food, they let you know.”