Birding Big Year: What's a Blue Jay worth?
For more than a few months now, birders all around southern Idaho have been reporting the presence of blue jays. While Idaho can boast of many jay species – like Steller’s, pinyon, Woodhouse’s scrub-jay, California scrub-jay and Canada – the blue is considered rare (1-2 records a year). They are so common east of the Great Plains that they border on the ubiquitous. Blue jays are strikingly beautiful; their commonality would never be likened to a starling or house sparrow. Even the most religious Auduboner will take pause in its presence.
For the big year birder, a blue jay sighting in say Arkansas is worth considerably less than one in Idaho – barely a tick mark on the way to 300 species. However, in Idaho, a blue jay sighting is not one to casually overlook. Birders must give chase. This is why (when one was reported in Albion about a month ago in a quiet little neighborhood) I would drive by the house where it frequented on every trip to Burley and beyond. A few weeks before, I got a call from Kathy – local expert – “I just heard the jay call and quickly located him.”
After such a report so close to home, there was no way I was going to get any work done until I too got the sighting. Insert comp-time here. Yes, officer Lynch, I kept it under 55. Upon arrival 25 minutes later, Kathy showed me where it has been hanging out and adds that the homeowner says he has been feeding the blue jay for over a month! (What?!!). There should be a local ordinance against concealing such critical information. Kathy wished me luck and took off after other hard birds, while I spent the next hour circling the block in vain.
Meanwhile, day after day, birding friends and local photographers continue to post their own blue jay sightings from Idaho Falls to Boise. Friends from Gooding took pity on me and invited me to their home where up to 7 blue jays have been coming for weeks. I was finding it hard to justify the trip, knowing that by late summer I would be guaranteed to see one in Kansas or Arkansas anyway. But this was a big year, and I was falling behind in the count. A bird in the hand…and all.
A few days ago, it happened. After several failed attempts, my adventures would bring me close to Gooding and a shot at the jays. Stationed behind the cover of window glare, I waited in Dan and Elaine’s kitchen. Less than 10 minutes passed before three blue jays swept in with a flock of house finches and dark-eyed juncos. Click, check.
On the drive home, I calculated what a blue jay sighting would have cost me this summer at a Kansas family reunion (freebie). An Idaho sighting on the other hand – including the epic fail in Albion ($85). What’s a blue jay worth? The bragging rights that I was a part of the 2020 blue jay eruption.