Remains of the Day

All that remains of several seconds of time are pictured above.  Those are tail feathers from a blue jay who had a near death experience under the squirrels' favorite feeding tree.  Here's the story....

There were some corn kernels and scattered seeds under the tree and the blue jay was hungry.  The tree sits near a low, dense evergreen.  The blue jay dropped down from the tree to eat the seeds and a stray cat immediately bounded from the evergreen where it had been lying in wait.  Just as the cat leaped to catch the jay Scott, the resident Gordon Setter and sworn enemy of squirrels, saw the cat.  The tree is only two setter bounds from the step where Scott was standing.  Both the cat and the dog were airborne together from different trajectories, but with the same spot targeted as ground zero - and that spot was occupied by the jay.  The cat landed on the blue jay and Scott landed on the cat.   Blue jays are noisy birds and do a lot of screaming, and this one was no exception especially since it was in the grasp of the cat.  Cats in peril do a lot of screaming and this one was no exception, especially since it was in the grasp of a Gordon Setter.  Much noise and hilarity ensued.

The cat released the the blue jay and attempted to turn to face the dog who by this time had the cat's tail secured in his mouth.   When Scott tried for a better grip the cat managed his escape and headed for a large pine tree with Scott in pursuit.  The cat made it up the tree and the blue jay managed to hop back up into the feeding tree.  The end result was that both the bird and the cat survived the ordeal though the jay left the two above tail feathers under the tree.

Nothing like a little life's drama played out before one's eyes.  I celebrated with a wee dram of Lagavulin single malt from Islay later in the day and Scott celebrated by peeing on both the evergreen and the pine tree.