At 08:37 AM 4/23/05, Garth Harwood wrote:
On Tuesday 4/19 I had a weird experience at Monte Bello. Rounding a
corner on the trail I saw a male deer, its antlers just beginning to
grow in and still covered in velvet. It was standing very still,
looking right at me, with its ears fully stretched. On its head,
right between the antler buds, stood a Western Scrub Jay! The WESJ
walked to and fro methodically checking through the deer's fur and
plucking things now and then, especially from the ears, both inside
and out. The deer was clearly appreciating this service and never so
much as blinked, even though it must smart to have ticks plucked out
that way. Eventually the bird hopped down to the deer's back and
worked it up and down also, finding little except on the neck. Once
it hopped up from the shoulder to get another inner-ear goodie.
Finally, I think I know how some deer deal with all those pests they
encounter. I wonder how often this occurs? I had heard of such things
on other continents with larger mammals, but I don't recall ever
hearing of it here before.
Dear Garth and SBB,
This is a very interesting story.
This may be a fairly common behavior, although infrequently observed.
Dixon (Condor 46:204 1944) was surprised to see this behavior in
Sequoia NP in the 1940s and it was knew to him (and he was an
experienced field naturalist). More recently, Isenhart and DeSante
(Condor 87:145-147) recount multiple observations at and near
Palomarin Field Station. They point out that this is observed only in
late winter and early spring when ticks are most common. The behavior
has also been recorded for Florida Scrub-Jays by Fitzpatrick and
Woolfenden (Condor 98:422-423). I recall that there is a recent note
in Western Birds as well, but I don't have a good index.
All of the above is based on a search for "scrub jay" in the SORA
archive. If you haven't used this marvelous resource before, then
give it a try. Dr. Blair O. Wolfe is one of the main instigators of
SORA and we are all indebted to him. Many on this list will remember
Blair at the Coyote Creek Riparian Station in the late 1980s. He got
his MS under the late Dick Mewaldt, studying Black Phoebes.
Bill Bousman
Santa Clara County records compiler
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