We’ve been bumping around 100° F for about a month now. It’s Texas. It’s hot.
Sometimes the blue jays do all they can to stay out of the sun — like this guy, who was bent on getting some of Kathryn’s weird purple peppers.
Blue jay working to get a purple pepper
Considering these shots were done in the shade, with just a 200 mm zoom, through a foggy window, they came out pretty well.
Blue Jay wrestles the pepper, or something, from the plant.
The peppers eventually grow to be the size of a Bing cherry — too big for the jays, then. They go after these peppers before they mature, and after they dry.
With her prize, the blue jay heads for its dining area in the live oak.
Mary K left us with her old bird feeder when she moved. This year we’ve kept feeders in both the front and back yards. Blue jays appear to have recovered from their West Nile devastation three years ago — we had one family nesting in the live oak earlier, in the spring — and Kathryn learned that the jays like peanuts still in the shell.
It’s been a good year for watching birds in our yard. Still haven’t captured that little green hummer in a camera, though.
Millard Fillmore's Bathtub 
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