Western Scrub-Jay, Aphelocoma Californica

 

Day 348: An infrequent visitor to my yard, a Western Scrub-Jay (Aphelocoma californica, also commonly called California Scrub-Jay) came calling yesterday and sat still long enough for me to get a photo through the window. This species has proved elusive for me photographically. I often saw them when I was bicycling the Chehalis-Western Trail, perching on phone lines just beyond reasonable zoom distance from my lens and invariably flying off if I tried to move closer. I suspect their shyness would diminish as they became familiarized with a feeding station, thinking of my mother's claim that her Steller's Jays were skittish, moving if she so much as blinked, quite a contrast to the brazen bunch around my home. I can hope that Scrubby will stick around, although in past years his residency has been limited to a few days at most. According to the field guides, the species is roughly the same size as Steller's, but Western Scrub-Jay gives the appearance of being a little bigger than Steller's in my experience. His colouration is reminiscent of the true Blue Jay, and that lovely white tuxedo bib is a give-away as to his identity.