Thursday, May 20, 2010

Blue Jay Nests in Blooming Wisteria

I can say I have never seen a blue jay nest, not near my house anyway. I can also say that in the 11 years I have owned my Wisteria plant, it has only bloomed a few times. Not enough blooms to even anticipate more the following spring, And some years? No blooms at all...
Yesterday, while serving breakfast to my two and half year old daughter, she asks, "Mama? Why is there a blue jay dancing on the wisssereea?"
Hmm. Dancing? And so I glance out of the kitchen window, and there before my weary eyes was not only three (!) giant Wisteria blossoms, but also, yes a blue jay. Not dancing, but MAKING A NEST in the Wisteria!!
I think I was told, "pull yourself together mama" about 3 times before I calmed down enough to talk about the extraordinary occurrence we were about to witness in the following weeks.
"Do you know how special this is?!?" I hissed. "Out of all the places these 2 birds (a mommy and a daddy) could have chosen to make a nest to have their babies, they chose our Wisteria! Our BLOOMING Wisteria!"
I went on to explain that very soon we would see 4-6 green and brown spotted (maybe) eggs and in 14-21 days after that, there would be baby blue jays eating breakfast with us every morning. That garnered some excitement.
I tried to take a picture of the blue jays in the nest, but I didn't want to scare them. The nest is only about 6 feet off the ground, under the eave of our garage, and right by our kitchen door. I hope we can be calm and quiet enough in the coming weeks for them to stay.
Can you see the nest to the right of the Wisteria blossom, a little cup shaped pile of sticks just over the green leaves in the middle of the picture?
It has been so fun to watch them come and go all day with sticks and grass in their beaks. They even chose a piece of ribbon that Ava and I left out on the patio from a project, to weave in!
Stay tuned, if I can get any pictures without disturbing this new little family, I will certainly share!

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