9.72 min.
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Continuing from "i," Scar comes down from the hibiscus tree for more peanuts. Then, the Western Scrub Jay perched on the patio cover beam, Scrubby, and his mate, Scrubbette, on the hibiscus tree branch, feature. These two have been hanging around my backyard for years.
Well, in between, one of the mated pair of California Towhees picks up a peanut. The boy is slightly more rotund, and is bolder. The girl was not around for this video.
Scrubby is a beautiful, handsome boy. Very confident. Recently, he hurt a talon on his left foot. Don't know if it's broken or not, but it's clear that he's finding it painful. He's, understandably, a bit less sure because of it. As well, he's not able to bounce around as effortlessly as he for so long had been. He used to fly confidently over to pick up peanuts right from my hand. Since his recent injury, he's much more cautious about doing so. So I've just been tossing him the peanuts. Make it a bit less stressful hopefully.
His mate, Scrubbette, broke her right leg about two years ago. It's affected her quite a bit. I wasn't sure that she would make it when the leg was basically unusable, when it would drag on the ground when she was trying to walk. I was concerned that the dragging would cause abrasions which would get infected, etc. But she made it. The break has healed, and she can use the right leg; nevertheless, the leg is nowhere near as good as it was before. She looks decidedly more disheveled and frail than she used to before her injury. She actually used to be even more confident and bolder than Scrubby. Since her injury, nowhere near as much. But she still soldiers on. I'm proud of her.
She is much more persistent in gathering nuts than Scrubby is. Scrubby will pick up at most about three peanut halves at a time, usually no more than two. Scrubbette will pick up up to 6 peanut halves. That's quite an endeavor for the little girl. They both try to cache/hide most of the nuts that they collect. Their ability to memorize is remarkable. I know that there's no way that I would be able to remember all the locations if I were to try to cache nuts as they do.
I do think that many, if not most, of the nuts that they try to hide, are recovered later by squirrels. The squirrels have fantastic sense of smell. They, however, contrary to common wisdom, all seem to have very poor sight. (They will not be able to locate nuts tossed right by them by sight. Only if they can detect the scent, will they be able to locate the nuts.)
In the video, Scrubby is the first to pick up a peanut. I wasn't able to capture it, but what happens next is that he passes the nut to Scrubbette. (They go through peaks and valleys in their relationship from what I can tell, and I don't think it simply has to do with the mating seasons. There are times when they seem to not be able to stand each other, and others when tenderness is evident. Again, it appears that this involves more than simply the time of the year.) He then picks up a couple of more nuts, and, finally, Scrubette flies in to pick up nuts (three) for herself.
There are, as is evident, also hordes of sparrows, various-crowned, etc., that hang out. It's interesting to see how un-homogeneous they are in terms of boldness, risk-aversion, behavior, etc., whereas we are so susceptible to stereotyping entire species, breeds, etc., into neat little uniform characteristics.
Not least, there's also a solitary Spotted Towhee, who is not in this video, who is a regular in the backyard. He is absolutely beautiful. I hope to capture him in video one day.
Tags: squirrel western scrub jay california spotted towhee sparrow
