Jays

The other day on our usual evening TV date, we watched an episode of The Big Bang Theory that featured a bird—a "blue jay," as Sheldon called it. But that warn't no blue jay. 

That got me wondering—of course—how many "jays" exist in the world. Turns out, a lot.

The one in the BBT episode is a Mexican black-throated magpie-jay (Calocitta colliei). There's a white-throated one too. They and the other jays are all corvids (in the crow family).

There are, apparently, 46 species of jays, according to the above image (though Encyclopedia Brittanica says 35–40, so who really knows). Ten species, for sure, are found in the US: blue, green, gray, pinyon, Canada, Mexican, and Steller's, plus three scrub jays, California, Florida, and island. Where I live, we have California scrub jays and Steller's jays, and I have communed on the Channel Islands in southern California with island scrub jays:

But look at this one, the green jay (Cyanocorax yncas), which is found on the coasts of Mexico and down into western South America:

Beautiful!

Then there's the Lidth's jay, endemic to the islands of southern Japan:

Also beautiful!

Or just look at the Mongolian ground-jay:

Okay. I'll end this little jaystravaganza with the actual blue jay, Cyanocitta cristata:

I have grown so used to our two local and very raucous species, it never occurred to me that these birds could have insinuated themselves globally. Or that they could take on so many lovely guises. Or that they all like to look off to the right. The island scrub jay being the lone, stalwart exception.