Florida Scrub-Jay
© Daniel Earnhardt
Florida's only endemic bird species (occurs nowhere else) can be found year-round throughout much of the peninsula at sites with well-managed oak scrub or shrub-scrub habitats. Florida Scrub-Jays form cooperative family units and work together as a team to raise young. The family will post a sentinel, who perches from a high vantage point, to keep an eye out for predators, while the rest of the family forages for nuts, berries and insects. The Florida Scrub-Jay is federally threatened and recent estimates indicate the current population is approximately 8,000 individuals. Major threats are habitat destruction and fire suppression.
For more information, including a range map and sound recording, visit The Cornell Lab of Ornithology's All About Birds website.
Recommended GFBWT sites:
- Jonathan Dickinson State Park
- Lake June-in-Winter Scrub State Park
- Lake Kissimmee State Park
- Lake Wales Ridge State Forest: Walk-in-the-Water Tract
- Lyonia Preserve
- Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge
- North Peninsula State Park
- Oscar Scherer State Park
- Platt Branch Wildlife and Environmental Area
- Savannas Preserve State Park
-
Seminole State Forest
Bird's habitat
Florida Scrub-Jays are found in the Florida peninsula at sites with fire maintained scrub or scrubby flatwood habitats.
