The hummingbirds finally showed up on Beachwood Drive a couple of weeks ago. We always had a number of them through most summers, but this year they have been conspicuously absent. There were a few of the males in the late spring as they began to arrive after the migration from Central America and Mexico. These amazing little creatures return to the same feeders or gardens each year.
The males are the first to migrate and as they began to arrive, they would approach our feeder that hangs outside the kitchen window. They would look at it, hover and fly away. I soon realized that they were not feeding. Eventually, they just disappeared and did not show up at all. I continued to replenish the food every couple of days to keep it fresh, but no little birds wanted to belly up to the feeder. We also have a large butterfly bush in our back yard that they like to feed on. No luck there, either. That was the case from May until a couple of weeks ago. A male approached our feeder, hovered around it and split.
Then it hit me. Our feeder was a nice expensive one and a few years old. The top hanger, the feeder and the perch on the bottom were made out of metal. It was a copper color with red metal flowers around the feeding holes. There had been plenty of traffic around it the past couple of summers, but I had noticed that the inside of the feeder was a little rusty as I cleaned it before putting in the first batch of food for the season. I thought that maybe the birds could smell or sense the rust inside the feeder, so I drove to Ace Hardware and bought a $9.99 red plastic one with a red plastic food bottle. I took it home and filled it about halfway with food. I took the old feeder down off the rope that hangs in front of the window and ran the new cheap red plastic one up. Then I waited.
I didn’t have to wait long. A little while later Jackie and I were sitting in the sunroom. “There’s a hummer,” she said. Sure enough, one was sitting on the perch of the feeder having a long cool drink. “Well, that’s good,” I said. “Let’s see if any more of them show up.” Before long there was another one on the perch before another flew up and ran it off. By the next day they were showing up in twos or threes, bickering and engaging in aerial combat.
I threw our old feeder away and realized that I had learned a lesson. First, more expensive does not necessarily mean better. Second, buy a plastic feeder. Third, buy a red one. So the little birds are back, feeding and dive-bombing one another in order to get to the feeder.
Birds are funny. I have a very cheap, beat-up plastic feeder that I hang outside the window during the winter and fill with seed for the finches and wrens. A few years back I went out and bought a nicer and larger feeder, filled it and hung it up outside the window. The birds wouldn’t come near it. I took it down and put the older one back up. They flocked to it. I also used to hang thistle socks up for the goldfinches. They fed off of them all the time until suddenly they decided they didn’t like them. I went to Wal-Mart, bought three of the plastic feeding tubes filled with thistle and they came back in droves. Go figure.
I realize that the hummers are only going to be around for a few more weeks before beginning their amazing bi-annual journey. But at least they came back. And next spring I’ll have a nice, slightly used red plastic feeder to greet them at the end of their trek. I just hope they don’t decide it’s too nice and I’ll have to go buy a $4.99 one. Red, of course.
Thanks for this post Jimmy. Hummingbirds are amazing. Love watching them. It’s funny, this side of the Mississippi, there is one species of Hummingbird, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. West of the Mississippi, there are 19 species of Hummingbirds that come to the U.S, during the Spring and Summer months. Oddly, the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird does not go West of the Mississippi. There is a small portion of area, between Western Louisiana, Texas and Eastern Arizona, where the Ruby-Throated and all of the Western species come. Very odd. When I had my house in North Carolina, around Jacksonville, NC, Camp LeJeune area, I had a Cherry Tree in the back yard, by my porch. The Ruby-Throated Hummers would show up, around the time it bloomed, and would stay until around Oct., then fly back down to Central America. I had 4 huge feeders hanging around the back porch and had hundreds of Hummers feeding from them. Had to fill them daily. It was amazing and I spent hours watching and marveling at them. I received orders to Camp Pendleton, CA and transfered to there. I rented a house, near the base and hung my feeders. I attracted a number of the Western species to the feeders, Black-Chinned Hummingbirds, a cousin of the Ruby-Throated Hummingbird. Red-Throated Hummingbirds, Rufous Hummingbirds, Annas Hummingbirds, among them. Loved watching the different species, but always missed my Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds. We get vagrants here, during the Winter months, in the Eastern United States, the and Rufus and Black-Chinned, the most common, but many of the others as well. I keep one feeder out, year round, in case one or more of these vagrants happens to come by. You can track the vagrants in your area, by dropping by Wild Bird World. They have info and give reports on vagrant sightings and progress. Haven’t seen any yet, but I always hope I will. Ruby-Throated Hummingbirds do the same thing, wander out of their Eastern territories and into the Western states, during the winter. Just more of the amazing livesof Hummingbirds. Thanks again for posting this,