Home » Grey Jay, Crater Lake Oregon (1 of 2)
Posted by NateW on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 02:13 :: Companion Birds

We were admiring the crater and watching chipmunks scurry around and beg for food at a viewing spot next to the road... Suddently this guy steps out of his car, holds up his hand, and has jays coming to him. Who would have guessed?

Turns out there's a $50 fine for that sort of thing. It was neat to see them up so close, though.
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Posted by JMK-Yoda on Tue, 11/22/2005 - 17:34.
? $50 for chipmunks beging, or for letting a bird land on you? And I thought NZ was tough!

A rich Russian made the national news yesterday by requesting permission to bring his pet parrot into NZ on his over sized yacht.

Murray NZ
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Posted by NateW on Wed, 11/23/2005 - 01:07.
I don't remember if the fines were only for feeding birds, or for feeding any sort of wildlife. They say that handouts cause the birds to cache less food for the winter, or they cache perishable food rather than the nuts and seeds they normally cache, and they spend less time picking apart pine cones which causes the pines to reproduce less.

I had to wonder if there's really a relationship between having a fully belly and foraging / caching for the winter, though. Those seem like two separate behaviors to me, so but I haven't seen any actual research on it so I'm just wondering out loud.

(I didn't get fined by the way... I just heard about the fine later.)


Nate Waddoups
Redmond WA USA
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