Blue Jay fight!

And it was a fight, not just a quarrel.  The blue jay family came this morning.  I'm not sure what happened, other then some other blue jays tagged along, maybe another family. They were very unwelcome. lots of birds crashing through the trees, lots of squawking, squealing, blue jays tumbling out of the trees, and cries. Two adults came out from the cover of trees attacking each other over the garden.  The young could be seen suddenly all flying through the trees, closer to where the fighting was taking place (but staying safely within the trees). They sounded a little pathetic...and scared. Eventually one blue jay came back and picked up a peanut from the garden. Oh so they were fighting over ONE peanut, and I guess one of them dropped it. I think this is the winner of the fight. Doesn't look tooooo bad for all the noise they made. But a bit ruffled up and looks like he got a poke or two in the chest.

The other birds were a bit freaked out. For the first few minutes they all added to the noise, then decided to take off for cover.  The squirrel was seen on the other side of the stream, on his way over for his breakfast and decided to stay over there until things calmed down.  The only ones that didn't seem disturbed were the butterflies and the downy woodpecker.

The woodpecker is a surprise, since they act so paranoid when they are feeding, having to look around them 20 or so times before they so much as take a peck.  I guess he felt everyone else was too busy to worry about what she was doing!

Then I got distracted by the butterflies!

I particularly liked this picture, taken through the leaves my my great Mullein

My obedient plant is blooming! I didn't notice the bug on top until I looked at the photo on the computer.

I don't think I'll ever get tired of taking photos of the butterflies.

here's one of my hanging baskets.

I saw quite a few tiny orange butterflies in the garden today, too small and too fast to get a photo.  Didn't help that the silver spotted skipper was intent on chasing them away!

Last but not least, the black capped chickadee.  not sure why but there's been very few here this summer.