Friday afternoon, the rain, which lasted several days, finally subsided, so I headed to Strathcona Park in a second attempt to meet the Western Scrub-Jay.
A bird of brushy areas, oak woods and bird feeders, common in western Washington and south but an uncommon visitor in BC, was reported a few times in my home range within the last month; two birds were seen in Strathcona Park community garden, on the west side of the park. But will it still be in this 0.8 hectare garden today’s afternoon?
It was. “Wow, you have a nice long tail. I was here for only 7 minutes, and here you are. You must really like this garden”. “7 minutes?!” The Scrub-Jay was concerned that I’m going to take him for granted, so he flew to another tree and then out of sight. Another human approached.
Before I got to say “You have a rare bird here!”, the human said: “Were you looking at the Scrub-Jay?” He was one of us. So we talked about birds for an hour, and he gave me a sweet bun.
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