How to Get Rid of Blue Jays? by BirdFeederist

The blue jay is a native bird of North America and mostly lives in the eastern and central United States. They are migratory birds and are also found in Canada and Newfoundland. These beautiful birds have a blue and white main color and increase the beauty of any garden. Many people love to attract the Blue Jays in their garden.  Still, some people wanted to get rid of the Blue jays.

There can be different reasons that people don’t want these in their garden as they have a loud voice, push out the other smaller birds, messy eaters, clever than other birds. Moreover, Blue jays come in groups, and they are aggressive dive bombers. So, let’s see how we can get rid of the Blue jays safely.

10 Tips to get rid of Blue Jays

1. Use Fake Owl

The Blue jays are bully birds, but they go back without fighting when they found anyone bigger than themselves. Owls are the legitimate predators of aggressive songbirds. You can’t find a wild Owl and train it for yourself to get rid of the Blue Jays. So, the best option is the use of the fake Owl. A fake Owl is a perfect thing to get rid of the Blue Jays without any actual threat of Blue jays killing while using the real Owl. Yes, the Blue jays are smarter than the other birds, but it doesn’t mean that they can distinguish between fake and real owls.

2. Get a cat

Sometimes the fake predator doesn’t work depending upon your home environment and other things. In that case, you need to move to the real predator, which cannot kill the birds. The cats are good to use in that case as they don’t actually catch the Blue jays. So, you can get the same benefit as the fake Owls or Snake. Blue jays can easily see them in your garden and assume them a threat. The cat’s movement in your garden or backyard is good to repel the Blue jays than the fake Owls.

3. Wind Chimes

You might don’t like to see the cat chasing birds in your garden; in that case, you can consider the Wind Chimes that are completely nonviolent. Blue Jays don’t like the sounds produced by the wind chimes. You can use the metallic, crystalline, or liquid material wind chimes as they are the most repellent for the Blue jays. The brightness and the sound of these chines prevent the Blue jays from landing in your garden. You can easily purchase chimes online or made them at home.

4. Blast Music

Blue Jays don’t like any type of music, especially loud music. But you can’t play music loudly all the time in your garden as your neighbors are also don’t want this type of disturbance all the time. So, to handle this issue, you can buy a digital device with a timer or a security system that will only trigger with the bird’s presence.

5. Update your feeder

If the blue Jays are continuously attacking your feeder, it’s time to be creative with it. You need to update your feeder to prevent it from bullying birds like Blue Jays so that the other small birds can easily feed on it. Sit near your feeder, and observe it. Try to find out any helping element for the wild birds, which is blocking the small birds. See tubing or mesh around the feeder trays. Ensure that the mesh surrounds the feeding tube so the birds can easily pass through and enter the chamber while the other wild birds cannot cross it.

6. Clear away stray seeds

Remember that the Blue jays are messy eaters and don’t mind eating the other birds’ messes. So, if you want to get rid of them, you need to keep clean your feeder’s surroundings. You need to cut out the food source of the blue jays completely. Especially, clean out the below ground of your backyard feeder.

7. Use an alternative feeder

If you like the Blue Jays’ beauty and don’t want Blue jays to eat from the small bird feeders, you can simply use the alternative feeders for the Blue jays. Allow the other birds to feed on alternative feeders without disturbing the small birds. You can also create a longer perch with a soda bottle on the top of each end; it will be good for the smaller birds while the bottle will spin with the too heavy birds like Blue jays.

8. Change the seeds

Sometimes blue jays don’t like to eat some specific seeds, which are usually perfect for small birds. For example, the Blue jays have not enjoyed the safflower seeds, and they leave the feeder alone when they found them.

9. Weight the Perch

Weight is one of the major advantages of the Blue Jays against the small birds. But you can get advantages of the more weight of the Blue Jay by creating the perches, which can only bear the small weight. You can set these perches around your feeder with the triggering system. These perches will drop below the feeding level when the wild birds try to sit on them. Small birds can easily perch on them and eat at any time. Similarly, you can also consider a feeder without perches as the small birds can feed without perching than the larger birds.

10. A Mirror up to their Nature

Blue jays are more intelligent than the other birds, but it doesn’t mean that they can recognize their reflection in the mirror. Birds always think that there is another bird in the mirror when they see their reflection. Blue jays will be agitated by this other bird and hopefully move to any other place searching for food. Yes, the small birds can also be affected by this, but usually, it is observed that large birds are more prone to this issue.

5 Weird Facts about the Blue Jays

Many people know the Blue jays as a good-looking and aggressive bird. But the people need to know some weird facts about the Blue jays, which makes them very special among the birds. Let’s see the five weird facts about the Blue jays.

• Blue jay rubs the ants on their feathers. Yes, you have heard correctly, blue jays do that, which is also known as anting. There are different theories proposed for this behavior of the Blue jays, but recent theories explain that the birds do that to prevent parasites and bacteria.
• The pigment found in the Blue jays feather is the same as the pigment found in human hair and skin.
• Blue jays can make a variety of sounds, and it is common to hear those mimicking hawks.
• Blue jays are known to collect paint chips to stock the source of calcium for the spring. So, make sure to provide them with the alternative of paint if you found them chipping away at the paint.
• Blue jays produce more noises in the fall than in spring and summer.

You can also read about some interesting facts about the Blue Jays.