{"id":12072,"date":"2011-12-07T13:32:31","date_gmt":"2011-12-07T18:32:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/?p=12072"},"modified":"2016-11-03T09:52:41","modified_gmt":"2016-11-03T13:52:41","slug":"gray-jays-have-a-secret-weapon-for-surviving-canadas-winters-hiding-food-in-trees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/omg_animals\/gray-jays-have-a-secret-weapon-for-surviving-canadas-winters-hiding-food-in-trees\/","title":{"rendered":"Gray Jays have a secret weapon for surviving the Canadian winter: hiding food in trees!"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>During the cold winter months many of Canada\u2019s birds <a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/top-10\/top-ten-most-amazing-migrations\/\">travel south to warmer climates<\/a> &#8211; many, but not all\u2026There are some birds that stay right where they are, surviving through the bitter cold and gusty winds of the great Canadian winter! The Gray Jay is one of these incredible birds that stick around all year long.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">\n<figure id=\"attachment_12073\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-12073\" style=\"width: 576px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12073  \" title=\"Gray Jays by Dan Strickland\" src=\"\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland.jpg\" alt=\"Two Gray Jays\" width=\"576\" height=\"431\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland.jpg 640w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland-300x224.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland-80x60.jpg 80w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland-160x120.jpg 160w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland-265x198.jpg 265w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland-530x396.jpg 530w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay_dan_strickland-561x420.jpg 561w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 576px) 100vw, 576px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-12073\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Photo Credit: Dan Strickland<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">Gray Jays laugh in the face of winter. Not only do they stay in the boreal forest throughout the year, they actually start to breed during February, when temperatures are below freezing.<br \/>\n<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-12074\" title=\"gray_jay\" src=\"\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"288\" height=\"372\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay.jpg 480w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay-232x300.jpg 232w, https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-content\/uploads\/gray_jay-325x420.jpg 325w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 288px) 100vw, 288px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>But how can they survive in temperatures that other birds fly far to get away from? That\u2019s where the trees save the day; the forest helps this bird thrive throughout the winter. During the summer and fall, Gray Jays stock up on berries, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/uncategorized\/finding-a-fungi\/\">fungi<\/a>, insects and other bird snacks and hide them in tree crevices throughout the forest. Then, when winter comes around, Gray Jays have lots of food to eat. Coniferous trees are the best because they have special antibacterial properties that make food last longer.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/this-just-in\/colours-of-a-biome-taiga-edition\/\">boreal forest<\/a> is important for tons of different animals that call this area home. Now that you know Gray Jays use these trees as their personal refrigerator we have another great reason to protect this forest.<\/p>\n<div>&nbsp;<\/div>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.eurekalert.org\/pub_releases\/2011-10\/uog-gjw100711.php\" target=\"_blank\">http:\/\/www.eurekalert.org\/pub_releases\/2011-10\/uog-gjw100711.php<\/a><\/p>\n<h5><em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.org\/\" target=\"_blank\">Earth Rangers<\/a> is a non-profit organization that works to inspire and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/bbtw\/resources.html\">educate<\/a> children about the environment. At EarthRangers.com kids can play <a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/games\/\">games<\/a>, discover <a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/wildwire\/category\/omg-facts\/\">amazing facts<\/a>, meet <a href=\"http:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/animals\/\">animal ambassadors<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bringbackthewild.com\/\">fundraise<\/a> to protect <a href=\"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/bbtw\/about.html\" target=\"_self\">biodiversity<\/a>.<\/em><\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How do some birds survive through the cold winter while other birds have to fly south? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12073,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[665,13,409,931,726],"tags":[62,224,174,168,422],"class_list":{"0":"post-12072","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-allbirds","8":"category-omg_animals","9":"category-omg-facts","10":"category-all","11":"category-winter-wonderland","12":"tag-birds","13":"tag-boreal-forest","14":"tag-canada","15":"tag-trees","16":"tag-winter"},"pp_force_visibility":null,"pp_subpost_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_force_visibility":null,"pp_inherited_subpost_visibility":null,"acf":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12072"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12072\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.earthrangers.com\/EN\/CA\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}