BIRD TALK: BIRD BRAINS

By Greg Dunne 

May 9, 2016 (San Diego’s East County) – Birdbrain? No, I’m not talking about my life-long friend Bud Morris and definitely not the Western Scrub Jay.  Make a mistake or do something considered stupid and you might be call a birdbrain by fellow humans. This phase could not be further from the truth. We have really missed the mark on judging and understanding the cognition of the bird kingdom. Memory, tool using, ability to learn, and communication are all skills used by most birds and are far above the rest of the animal kingdom with the exception of dolphins, whales, elephants and great apes.

They are masters at storing away thousands of seeds during the autumn months and retrieving them when the pickings get slim during winter – they have an impressive 70% recall rate when going back to retrieve their seeds. In addition, added to their memory of where they hide their seeds, they remember the hiding places of where other birds have stashed seeds.  Jays and other birds even resort to trickery.  If the Scrub Jay is aware it is being watched by another bird when hiding seeds, it will often go back and re-hide them elsewhere. A couple of the Jay’s favorite victims of seed and acorn thievery are the Acorn Woodpecker and the Clark’s Nutcracker. The Western Scrub Jay’s diet consists of everything from small animals such as lizards and insects, to acorns, seeds, as well as some fruits and cherries. I remember a birding acquaintance feeding Scrub Jay peanuts from his hand in his backyard.

You always know when the Scrub Jays are in your yard as they are noisy and very loud with their harsh cries. It’s almost hard to believe they can be soft chirpers, but when near their nesting sites they communicate often and are very quiet about it, so as not to attract any predators to the nest.  They are very aggressive in chasing off the larger birds and even hawks but seem to be selective and often not aggressive to smaller birds.  I still get a little chuckle when I see a Jay swopping down on Little Gray my 16-year-old cat. The Jays raid my bird feeders often in the morning; thankfully, Scrub Jays only travel in small groups or pairs. They are very territorial, so it’s unusual to see many in a single area. The Western Scrub Jay is in the corvidae family of birds that includes Crows, Ravens, Magpies some of the most intelligent birds we see every day.

Another unique characteristic of the Western Scrub Jay is the fact that they appear to have funerals. I saw this years ago and wasn’t aware of what was going on. Although I realized at the time they were making a fuss over the fact that another Jay was dead. I only watched for a few minutes as they were concerned with my presence and were not fully engaged in what they were doing. Research and witnesses have seen this ritual go on for 30 minutes or more. The life span of the Western Scrub Jay is approximately 9 to 15 years. The oldest captive Jay lived 19 years and 8 months.

The Western Scrub Jay is a beautiful, sharp looking bird. I’m always intrigued by its awareness of its surroundings. It’s an inquisitive bird and seems to know more about what is going on around the area than I do. Maybe it has an advantage because of its aerial view high in the tree, or maybe on some level it’s as smart as I am!? How intelligent are these birds? I think there is still a lot to be learned about “animal intelligence”. Not to be measured in human intelligence, to learn calculus or scientific studies, musical compositions or arts, but to be measured in nature’s intelligence and we are part of nature. Wikipedia starts out with these words on intelligence. Intelligence is the intellectual capacity of humans, which is characterized by perception, consciousness, self-awareness, and volition. Through their intelligence, humans possess the cognitive abilities to learn, form concepts, understand, apply logic, and reason, including the capacities to recognize patterns, comprehend ideas, plan, problem solve, make decisions, retain information, and use language to communicate. Intelligence enables humans to experience and think. Sounds to me the Western Scrub Jay has most of these down.