July 2: Blue Jay crisis

Blue Jays built a nest on our front porch and hatched out one nestling, now half-grown. Unfortunately today it prematurely bailed out of the nest, and then did it again and again each time Paul replaced it. We can't tell if it hurt itself in the fall or is just weak because its parents are too busy dive-bombing everything in the yard to look after it. But after consulting Avian Haven, the bird rehabilitation place in Freedom, Paul put it in a basket with some soft rags and hung it up by the nest in hopes that the parents will resume tending to it. We have been trying not to care too much, because you just can't get attached to a baby bird, but the vulnerable little thing did hatch on our porch...

This won't end well--
I wish the struggling jay
hadn't clung to my finger.

July 3 update: The baby jay, in rough shape but still alive this morning, was transferred to Avian Haven.