“the beauty of innuendoes” (Wallace Stevens)

When I come down in the mornings, usually around 6:30, there are Steller’s jays waiting for me on the railings of the deck just outside the kitchen or else in the fir beyond it or the stray apple tree (the product of a seed and kind of miraculous) . In winter, it’s often 3 or 4, sometimes more. They begin a raucous noise as soon as they see me. I feed the cat first and put the kettle on for coffee. Then I take a handful of black sunflower seeds out to the two posts nearest the sliding glass doors leading to the deck. The jays demolish the seeds within seconds, one gobbling until it’s pushed away by another. They’re aggressive towards one another, though their initial call seems to be social, chack chack chack, alerting others to the food source. They are so smart. If seeds fall to the deck, they know exactly where to find them. If seeds fall between the cracks of the deck boards, they use their beaks like tools to extract them. They love dry roasted peanuts and I’ve noticed they’re quieter if peanuts come out, perhaps wanting to eat their fill before the others discover the treats. If I don’t come with seeds within a few minutes of coming into the kitchen, they stand by the sliding doors and squawk. Sometimes they kick the glass. Over the years, they’ve educated me to their needs, which seems pretty intelligent. It’s not just the mornings when I put out the seeds. Usually they arrive and demand food 3 times a day. They come every day until they don’t. And that makes me think someone else in the vicinity is offering something better. Hazelnuts maybe? We have two hazelnut trees but somehow the jays always get to the nuts before we do. They can live quite a long time; a banded bird in Alaska lived at least 16 years. So I often wonder if I’m seeing birds who’ve come for a decade, or their offspring, or theirs.

There are days when I watch their behaviours and wonder about their private lives. Like all corvids, they’re intelligent and adaptable. Why do they whistle sometimes? Courtship, I think. Music, not noise. You think you know something but you never know enough.

Last evening was beautiful here after a day of rain, sunny periods, a couple of hail storms, lots of rain. We decided to eat outside, not at the big dining table under the wisteria and grapes, but at a little table pushed against the wall for the extra warmth. It’s not far from the posts where I put the seeds out for the jays. Two arrived as we were carrying plates out. They didn’t make the social call, they didn’t make the string of whistles, but instead softly churred, more to each other than to us. John said he thought they might be nesting in a bigleaf maple down below the house because he’d seen them plucking at moss there a few days earlier. I’ve tried spying with my binoculars but can’t really tell if there’s a nest. Last night, though? The churring pair fed peacefully from the same post once I’d put seeds on both posts. They demonstrated a kind of courtesy towards one another, one pecking and then tapping the seed open (usually they carry the seeds away for stashing), and then the other would do the same thing. I suspect these are a nesting pair and sure enough, they headed over to the bigleaf maple. No loud calls this time and no crowds.

This morning there were two jays waiting for me. The same ones? I wish I could tell. There’s so much I don’t know (about everything but maybe jays in particular). I looked out the window at the maple, wondering about a nest. There was only the sound of ferry traffic down on the highway, the first ferry having arrived at Earls Cove ten minutes earlier. And in my mind, as I ground coffee beans, folded towels for our swim, I heard the churring again, saw the courtly behaviour of last evening’s couple. I thought of Wallace Stevens:

I do not know which to prefer,   

The beauty of inflections   

Or the beauty of innuendoes,   

The blackbird whistling   

Or just after.