Home › Birds A–Z › Blue Jay

A bold, crested blue-and-white jay with a black necklace and a loud, ringing call.

How to spot it

A large, crested songbird about 25–30 cm long — blue above with white underparts, a black "necklace" across the chest, and bold black-and-white barring on the wings and tail.

Where it lives

Common across eastern and central North America in oak and pine woodland, parks and leafy suburbs. Some northern birds migrate in loose daytime flocks; many stay put all year.

What it eats

Acorns, nuts, seeds and insects, plus the occasional egg. It caches thousands of acorns each autumn, and the ones it never retrieves help oaks spread.

Song & behaviour

Noisy and bold, with a harsh, ringing "jay! jay!". A skilled mimic, it often copies the scream of a hawk to send other birds scattering from a feeder.

Nesting

Both birds build a cup of twigs, bark and rootlets in a tree fork, and the pair turn quiet and secretive around the nest.

← Back to all birds