The Story
I photographed this Bushy-crested Jay (Cyanocorax melanocyaneus) in the Microcuenca La Hondura, the forested watershed just west of Santa Rosa de Copán, Honduras. It is native to Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua, between about 600 and 2,450 meters, in humid forest with pine and oak, at forest edges and in scrub. It adapts well to changed habitat and has become common in coffee plantations and around farmland. It is a social bird that lives in small groups. IUCN lists it as Least Concern.
I photographed it with a Canon R5 and the RF 800mm f/11 plus the RF 1.4x extender, at 1/750 sec, f/16, ISO 3200, +0.5 EV. La Hondura was once the town dump, and today it is a 686-hectare protected forest of pine and mixed pine-oak that supplies Santa Rosa de Copán with water.
©2022 Adam Rainoff Photographer
The bird
The Bushy-crested Jay (Cyanocorax melanocyaneus) belongs to the family Corvidae (Crows, Jays, and Magpies) in the eBird/Clements taxonomy.
Source: eBird.org (opens in a new tab)
Conservation
Least Concern on the IUCN Red List (assessment published 2020), with the population trend listed as stable. Source: IUCN Red List