Scrub jays return, but stay is unlikely

There probably aren't enough birds to build a population.

By DAN DeWITT, Times Staff Writer
Published January 14, 2008

ADVERTISEMENT [Lara Cerri | Times (2007)] This Florida scrub jay was photographed in early 2007, at Oscar Scherer State Park in Osprey, south of Sarasota, where the population of scrub jays is plentiful.

BROOKSVILLE - Workers from the state Division of Forestry recently found three Florida scrub jays in the Richloam Tract of the Withlacoochee State Forest.

Because scrub jays are poor fliers, they probably arrived from a farm in nearby Sumter County, said Vince Morris, a Forestry ecologist. They settled in a 50-acre plot that had been cleared of diseased slash pines, accidentally creating habitat the jays demand, with low-growing oaks and bare patches of sand.

There is good reason Morris has paid attention to these birds in far eastern Hernando County: They are likely the only scrub jays in the county, and, because their numbers are so small, the cluster is probably doomed, Morris said. "How do you manage a population with just one breeding pair?"

The Nature Conservancy recently created a stir with a report that showed a decline in several of the scrub jay communities it monitors through its Jay Watch program.

The results echoed a report last summer from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service that found falling populations, even in publicly owned preserves. A story about these studies in the Ledger in Lakeland ran with a map that showed Hernando as one of seven counties in the state where the scrub jay population is expected to die off.

"We're in the process of putting together a plan to see how we can respond to this," said Joe Murphy, conservation chairman of the Hernando Audubon Society. "It would be an environmental catastrophe if this species - which is found only in Florida, which is a defining species for Florida - went extinct in our lifetime or in the lifetime of our children," he said.

Though both organizations said they were puzzled by the Ledger's map, saying they knew of no county-by-county studies, local birders and ecologists say it confirms what they have long noticed in the field.

Most birders assumed scrub jays had already disappeared from Hernando, for the same reason many other species have died off or struggle to survive: loss of habitat.

Florida less hospitable

The birds - about the same size as blue jays but without their crests and white-tipped wings - can live only in landscape that is a relic of an era when Florida was drier and even hotter than it is now, said Adam Kent, scrub jay conservation coordinator for the state Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

Poor soil and frequent fires left patches of sand that made it hard for snakes to sneak up on the jays. Scrub supports plenty of small oaks bearing acorns that are the birds' main food source, but few tall trees that could hide predatory hawks.

"You know you're in good scrub habitat when you can feel the sun beating down on your head," said Mike Jennings, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.

Scrub jay habitat once covered large areas of Florida, including much of western Hernando. But by 1993, when the service completed its last comprehensive survey of the jay population, only about 11,000 birds remained statewide.

That number has almost certainly declined, biologists said, though they don't know for sure because the recent reports looked at various clusters of scrub jays and no agency has conducted a comprehensive statewide census of the jay population. The species is not considered endangered because most of the state's scrub jays live in two large preserves - the Ocala National Forest and the Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, Jennings said.

Only two sighted since '95

In Hernando, the situation is more dire, said Bev Hansen, a longtime member of the Hernando Audubon Society. The county's jay population in recent decades was centered around Weeki Wachee Springs.

Scrub jays were last regularly seen there in 1995, said Hansen, who has made one of the two scrub jay sightings in western Hernando County since then. She saw a solitary jay from the parking lot of the attraction in May 2004. Another birder said he saw a jay north of the attraction a year ago, but no other birder has been able to duplicate that finding.

The disappearance of jays from the land around the attraction is especially disappointing to birders because its owner, the Southwest Florida Water Management District, cleared 304 acres seven years ago to prevent dangerous wildfires and restore scrub.

The property is now "marginal scrub habitat," said Mary Barnwell, a senior land management specialist with the district. Because it is close to human populations, it is probably patrolled by feral cats that hunt the jays, she said. Some birds have probably been killed trying to cross U.S. 19 or County Road 550. "They are not very adept flyers," Barnwell said. "Around highways, their survivorship tends to be low."

Still, she has not lost all hope.

The scrub oaks that were destroyed during the initial clearing of the Weeki Wachee property will continue to mature, producing more acorns for the birds to eat and better shelter for their nests. "It's not a closed book," Barnwell said. "I wouldn't write it off yet."

[Last modified January 13, 2008, 21:22:33]