old birds and young

After the owl activity of the past couple of days, I was sure that this morning's noisy Blue Jay was kicking up a fuss about a roosting predator. Quite the contrary, it turned out to be a young jay, old enough to fly, but still following one of its parents around (can't tell which one) and asking to be fed with all the wing fluttering and vocal begging that it can muster.

While at least one local jay is still taking care of its offspring (and Goldfinches are presumably still in their nesting phase), other birds have moved on. Not a single Purple Martin seen or heard this morning and only a handful of Barn Swallows. On the creek, Royal Terns are active with their flying young. Many of the pairs of terns that come up the creek consist of an adult with a young bird -- born somewhere south of here but accompanying its elders to our waters. The birds call to each other; the adult vocalization is easily recognizable as the finger-on-the-comb call but the call of the young bird is also not difficult to remember. I don't see the adults feeding their young in flight (although they may do so when I'm not looking) but I think the young get a lesson in how to look for fish and how to dive to catch them. And the activity of the terns as well as the disturbed surface of the waters in the creek and pond, tells me that local fish activity is on the increase.

Eric Salzman