One Eyed Blue Jay Fledgling~

Monday evening while my husband was walking our dog, he discovered a Blue Jay fledgling with problems. It was missing it's left eye, no seen injury, just no eye. Possibly born this way, possibly one of the nestlings pecked it, nevertheless, only one eye. I gave it shelter and fed it and rang up 1 of only 5 KY licensed songbird rehabbers. Brigette explained to me that what I was doing was correct and that my gut instinct to get this young one back to it's family would be the best option. It was in a weakened state so Tuesday it was fed all day and the cage was moved outside, so that it could hear it's own kind. Yesterday morning when I went to feed it, right above it's cage was an adult Blue Jay making conversation with it. That was when I decided to free it and just watch and see. It flew with parent very well and the adults wasted no time in feeding it for first time since Monday afternoon. Since I have free time on my side, I observed from a distance for several hours. It would fly from tree to tree and then end up on the ground as many fledglings do, however a one-eyed fledgling was a new story. After observing this take place a couple of times, it ended up in a very precarious situation and I had just about reached it to lift it up, when it finally flew from the ground and up into a nearby tree. Yeah, if it could do this, that was a great sign. Then late last evening the hawks...all 3 went on the hunt on the grove and as the young Jay was back on the ground, I intervened just for the evening to allow it safety and gain a bit more strength. This morning, once again, I released it to it's parents and it had a couple of bad starts, but at the time that I left it, it was in a tree with 2 more fledglings and the adults were quite busy feeding all of them. I might add, this did not all go off without me being hit a few times in the head by the adults, which did not hurt. The last thing the adults did was call in their troops and treat me as if I were a snake, cat, or hawk and they yelled at me from all directions, even though I was a good distance away, as well as I was only taking photographs of other things~






Note~ Brigette told me about a Veterinarian's story of how a study was done at Auburn and a few one eyed Owls had been released and how they had prevailed very well. I am not so sure how this young Jay will do, but if anything happens, it will be wild and free, and I shall of done the right thing~