‘A piece of the puzzle.’ How annual count helps protect endangered Florida bird

In the heart of Florida’s scrub lands in the scorching summer heat, the next generation of a very special bird is just beginning to explore the world.

“They are just so gawky and awkward,” says Audrey DeRose-Wilson of Florida scrub jay fledglings. “ The adults are sitting on a branch looking around and the babies are just falling off the branch. They’re silly and hilarious. It’s fun to see them and their antics.”

DeRose-Wilson is Audubon Florida’s Director of Bird Conservation, and she organizes the group’s annual Jay Watch count.

The citizen science program uses bird-loving volunteers around the state to tally numbers of the threatened scrub jay on public lands, including in Manatee County and Southwest Florida .

The boisterous and social songbirds with vivid blue and soft gray feathers are found only in Florida, and they are down to less than 10% of their former numbers due to habitat loss. The main culprits are development and a lack of the fire that scrub needs to thrive.

The data collected during Jay Watch helps monitor the statewide population. It also informs the people who oversee scrub jay habitat where recovery efforts are going well and where the birds need more help as conservationists try to fight off their extinction.

“We’re a piece of the puzzle,” DeRose-Wilson said.

What’s so special about scrub jays?

As their name suggests, Florida scrub jays are found nowhere else in the world but Florida.

Scientists refer to them as an indicator species. If scrub jays are doing well, scrub habitat is doing well, and vice versa.

Besides the scrub jay, the sandy, shrubby, desert-like scrub habitat found on ridges in Florida supports many other unique plants and animals.

“What’s good for scrub jays and good for their habitat is good for a lot of other wildlife,” DeRose-Wilson said.

Prescribed burns that land managers use to maintain scrub jay habitat also keep people safe by preventing out-of-control wildfires, DeRose-Wilson said.

Another benefit of protecting scrub?

“Scrub jay habitat also represents areas that recharge our aquifer,” DeRose-Wilson said. “What’s good for scrub jays is also good for our drinking water.”

Where are Florida scrub jays found?

Scrub jays are found “only in low-growing oak scrub and scrubby flatwoods with sandy soils in Florida,” the Cornell Lab of Ornithology says. “Within these patches of oak scrub, they frequent relatively open areas with bare sandy patches.”

Scrub occurs within the “highest and driest” areas of the state, many of them made of ancient sand, according to the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission.

In Manatee County, scrub habitat is found out east.

It’s one of the few areas in the state where conservationists have documented an increase in scrub jay numbers.

The most recent population estimate is 24 families of scrub jays in Duette Preserve and up to 60 families in the region, which includes state-owned and private lands, according to Manatee County.

They credit the success to land conservation, careful land management and close-knit collaboration between government agencies, non-profits and the private sector to protect the imperiled birds.

How are scrub jays counted?

Each site is surveyed over a three-day period, DeRose-Wilson said.

A survey route is plotted out, and volunteers stop at the same points each day.

At each stop, they play recorded scrub jay calls to lure the birds out.

The juveniles are easy to identify by their head of brown feathers, which will eventually be replaced with bright blue.

Over the three-day period, Jay Watch bird counters get an accurate picture of how many total scrub jays, juveniles and families live at the site.

That information is then passed on to land managers.

How to participate in Jay Watch programs

Audubon Florida’s Jay Watch program happens in June and July each year.

Participants are trained in Jay Watch methods and then assigned to sites that are convenient to them.

Audubon’s Jay Watch sign-ups are closed for 2024, but information to sign up for future counts can be found at FL.Audubon.org/get-involved/jay-watch .

Locally, Manatee County is hosting a Jay Watch count at Duette Preserve over the Fourth of July weekend.

Visit MyManatee.org/ecoevents for more info.

Why they Jay Watch

We asked some longtime Jay Watch participants why it’s important to them. Here’s what they said:

• “If people are going to change the landscape to the extent that we do, we have some responsibility to ensure the conservation of species that are affected by that,” said Zach Holmes, an avian ecologist whose experience volunteering for Jay Watch set him on a path toward pursuing a doctorate in bird studies. “ There’s a lot of work that needs to be done. It’s currently a bleak picture for a lot of places where development is continuing.”
• “The idea is to document the growth or decline of the population,” said Kay Prophet, a former president of the Manatee County Audubon Society who has participated in Jay Watch since it began over 20 years ago. “Here’s the beauty of Jay Watch — our report will go to that land manager and then a conversation can happen about where to manage next.”

• “They are a very charismatic species to watch,” DeRose-Wilson said. “They’re one of the few bird species that live in family groups with helper birds in each family that help parents raise offspring. So there’s a lot more opportunity for social interaction.”

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