Wayne Peal

Livingston Daily

When he first saw the "little fuzzy ball" lying in the tall grass near his home, Derik Jones had no idea what it was and he couldn't possibly have imaged what this most unexpected pet would mean for his family.

But it's all true.

Jones was trimming with a weed wacker outside his Oceola Township one day early this summer home when when he first saw — and heard — it.

"It was this little fuzzy ball," he said.

Closer inspection reveled it to be a peeping blue jay chick, left all alone in the world.

Touched by its plight, Jones and wife, Amii, moved to save it from a certain demise.

"We put it in a little box and I begin looking on the internet as to how we could best take care of it," he said.

They filled the box with rags to keep the baby bird safe and warm while Jones searched online for what to do next. His search revealed that little bits of moist dog food worked best for the little, gray fuzzy chick —and, boy, was it hungry.

"The little guy would chirp and chirp as if to say 'Feed me now,'" Jones said with a laugh.

The couple's three young grandsons all helped out, too. It gave them something special to do — and a new friend to bond with — after the recent passing of their dad at age 27 from a brain aneurism.

In a few short weeks, the chick had turned into a full-grown female jay.

"You could tell it was a female because it was less brightly colored than the male and, in nature, that's the way it is," Jones said.

Just that quickly, it was time for the now-adult bird to leave its man-made nest.

And it did — but then something unusual happened.

The bird kept coming back.

"Every day we'd see her," Jones said.

That relationship has continued throughout the summer.

Blue jays aren't known for bonding with humans. Yet this bird, named by Miss-Blu-Jones by Jones' wife, has made itself at home with the family and its neighbors.

It flies into the house when family members open the door and is a frequent visitor to a neighbor's new pool, Jones said.

No one knows for sure how long the friendship will last; however, the Joneses will long remember the summer when a little fuzzy ball brought a lot of unexpected happiness into their lives.

Contact Livingston Daily reporter Wayne Peal at 517-548-7081 or wpeal@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @wpeal.