Hummingbirds in the trees

Growing up back East I don’t recall ever seeing a hummingbird. I’m amazed that to see these flying treasures now, all I have to do is go out to our garden or up on our deck. The first photo is a female Anna’s hummingbird perched on a tree in our yard.

As part of making our garden into a wildlife habitat through the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), we provide food, water and cover for local and migrating animals. My husband George's garden includes many flowers for nectar, and he is always replenishing the sugar-water feeders for the hummingbirds. He also avoids using pesticides, because they could harm or kill the birds.  Here's an article by NWF about feeding hummingbirds.  The sugar-water is a supplement to their diet of insects and nectar.  This article goes into more detail, and has good advice about the important issue of keeping your feeders clean.

The next two photos are male Anna's - the brilliant head and neck feathers shine with iridescence when they catch the light.  You see how different the colors of the two are, one is more orange while the other has a saturated magenta hue.

The next photo shows the unusual ability hummingbirds have to hover - they're among the limited species of birds that can.

When awake, hummingbirds are almost constantly in motion. I had to quickly take the photos of them perching on the tree, because they don't land for long. The next shot in the row shows two of them, one about to land on a branch, and another zooming by above. I also caught one young hummer with his beak open.

Do you know what kinds of hummingbirds visit or live in your area? I'm lucky to have George, who has studied this extensively, to tell me who's who. He said that at this time of year we're getting only the Anna's hummingbirds, and that many of them stay with us year-round. Does your garden have nectar flowers or other plants to attract and feed hummingbirds?  Do you have hummingbird feeders to supplement their diet?

Here is the link to the original blog post on my website.

And to see more of my photographs of birds, click here.