The Powerful Memory of Jays

Jays gather acorns and bury them in the ground for future use. Sometimes they bury up to a thousand acorns in a day. Everything in a forest looks alike. This is why it is difficult even for human beings to find a certain place in a forest. So how can jays find the places where they have hidden their acorns? They act intelligently and mark these places using tree branches or pieces of stone. Still, it is quite difficult to find something buried in a forest. However experiments have revealed that these birds can find their acorns even nine months later. It is a miracle of creation that these birds have such a powerful memory that they can mark the places where they hide their food and then remember these places.

It is certainly not possible to explain the decision of a jay, which does not have intellect as we understand it, to hide acorns by burying them in the ground or marking these secret places to find them in the future as occurring by coincidence.

Burying a thousand acorns and marking their places with stones and branches in an orderly way is certainly something that a bird cannot achieve on its own. It is very natural for a bird to eat an acorn as soon as it finds it. However, only an intelligent being can save it for future use, mark the place where it is hidden and know this mark later.

A bird cannot do any of these by itself. Therefore, we see that there is a Being Who possesses endless wisdom, has power over all things and makes jays do all the things they do. This superior wisdom belongs to Allah, Who created everything perfectly in an order and rules them all. This bird hides its food only because Allah wills so, and can find it only if Allah wills. As in every creation of Allah, we witness the signs of His perfect creation in this bird too.