The Story
I photographed this Green Jay (Cyanocorax yncas) at Urapanes del Bosque in Cajamarca, Tolima, Colombia, at about 2,020 meters, in October 2020. In the Andes it ranges south from Colombia and Venezuela through Ecuador and Peru to Bolivia. These jays usually build their nest in a tree or a thorny thicket, and the female lays three to five eggs. Only the female incubates, but both parents care for the young. Like most typical jays it has a large repertoire of calls, and one sounds like an alarm bell. IUCN lists it as Least Concern.
I used a Pentax K-1 with the HD Pentax-D FA 150-450mm f/4.5-5.6 for this one, at 1/250 sec, f/5.6, ISO 1600. Cajamarca, whose name means ‘cold land’ in Quechua, is known as Colombia’s agricultural larder.
©2021 Adam Rainoff Photographer
The bird
The Green Jay (Cyanocorax yncas) 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 2025), with the population trend listed as increasing. Source: IUCN Red List