The Hummingbird Haven

[Blooie]

Welcome to the Hummingbird Page. I have loved these little stinkers for years. Thanks to their visits, my yard has been certified as a "National Wildlife Habitat" by the National Wildlife Federation. Here you are welcome to share your photos, videos, and stories of these little miracles. In my yard I am blessed with Broadtailed, Rufous, Calliope, and BlackChinned.

Just remember these few things:

Behave yourself! All BYC rules apply to this page just as they do on all others. Although I can't see any reason for disagreement on this thread, rudeness or trolling will not be tolerated but will be reported.

Any photos and videos you post MUST BE YOUR OWN, taken by you or a family member. That means no swiping from the internet. The one exception to that rule is if we are discussing something highly unusual. In that case, post a link to the page with photos, videos or stories, but you may not take the photos off that page and post them unless you are prepared to give full credit to the original photographer. Hummingbirds can be notoriously difficult to photograph, and the folks who took those pictures have every right to have their efforts respected just as you do.

Whenever possible, post your photo with identification of the hummer. This can be difficult, because females and juveniles look similar in many varieties, and in areas where territories overlap trying to figure out which bird is at your feeder or flower ain't always easy!

Ready, set, GO!



Female Rufous
Taken near sunset with a Canon Rebel EOS T2i. The camera came with a telephoto lens but it doesn't have image stablization so I set up my tripod and used a remote shutter to prevent camera shake.

 

[enola]

I will be following this thread. I love hummingbirds. I fed them religiously when I lived in Waterloo. I moved here and hung my feeders, and to my surprise, none showed up!

 

[N F C]

This will be a fun thread to subscribe to, thanks Blooie!

We get some hummers at our feeder but I'm not quick enough or equipped enough to get good pictures. I'll just enjoy everyone else's!

 

[WVduckchick]

Thanks Blooie!
I take so many pics, they are hard to choose from, but here are a few. I call the little guy "King" sitting on the shepherds hook. He guards the feeders. And one of me feeding one was taken in a park in Ohio, where they have feeding parties. People come from all around to sit and hand feed them! I sat for hours that day!

 

[Blooie]

This will be a fun thread to subscribe to, thanks Blooie!

We get some hummers at our feeder but I'm not quick enough or equipped enough to get good pictures. I'll just enjoy everyone else's!

I thought another thing that might be fun is for folks to share their tips and techniques for taking pictures of hummers. I'll bet you'd have some pictures before too much time at all! Maybe whenever possible we should also list what camera we were using at the time. What do you think?


My first pictures were so much fun! This one was taken with a little Fuji point 'n shoot camera. I had to crop the heck out of it to even see him on there!

I will be following this thread. I love hummingbirds. I fed them religiously when I lived in Waterloo. I moved here and hung my feeders, and to my surprise, none showed up!

If you hang it, they will come! Took me forever! I saw one once, ran to Cody and got a feeder, came home, filled it,and never saw him again. So that fall I took the feeder down, cleaned it, wrapped it, and put it away. Next summer, boom! A hummingbird! Got out the feeder, rinsed it well, hung it, and never saw him again. <sigh> Forgot to even take the darn feeder down! Third year I saw one at the empty, dried up feeder. I grabbed that feeder, brought it in, cleaned it well, filled it, and he ate from it as I was carrying it out to hang.

Before I knew it I was keeping 11 feeders going all summer!!

@WVduckchick Something like that would be so much fun! When I got my certification for providing a Wildlife Habitat, they sent a press release to our local newspaper. The owner/editor is a good friend of ours (I also write a political column for his paper) and he sent a reporter out. Brad did a pretty good job - messed up a few quotes but other than that it was a fairly nice article. But after that I kept running into people who said, "I've never seen a hummingbird here!" or "I didn't even know we had hummingbirds this far north!" Before I even knew what happened, it seemed like every yard in Cowley was sporting at least one hummingbird feeder and the population at my house dwindled significantly. You know, that's okay. It picked up the next year, and so did the hummingbird traffic throughout the entire town.

 

[enola]

The only advice I can think of is to have many different feeders placed at many different places in your yard. Male humming birds do not like to share!!

 

[Blooie]

The only advice I can think of is to have many different feeders placed at many different places in your yard. Male humming birds do not like to share!!

Boy,that's no kidding! They can be worse bullies than the meanest old biddy in the coop! Every spring I have a bright red tablecloth that I hang out on the clothesline. I drape it over the top of all three wires so it looks like a squared off tent. I also put out the first couple of feeders with a red bow or fake flower hanging over or on it. Seems to remind them to check this place out first.

I usually have no problem with the Calliopes, Black Chinned and Broadtailed sharing. But the minute the Rufous show up it's a free-for-all out there.

 

[chicken pickin]

The only advice I can think of is to have many different feeders placed at many different places in your yard. Male humming birds do not like to share!!

Really? I didn't know that about the male birds.

I keep one feeder on our front deck, right outside of our kitchen window, it allows us to have the best view of them. They often stop and flutter in front of the window and seem to just watch us, its quite amazing. I only have a camera phone so I haven't been able to capture pictures well but I would like to try. I just love hummingbirds!

 

[chicken pickin]

@Blooie your pictures are just amazing!!!

 

[Julie Birb]

Thanks Blooie!
I take so many pics, they are hard to choose from, but here are a few. I call the little guy "King" sitting on the shepherds hook. He guards the feeders. And one of me feeding one was taken in a park in Ohio, where they have feeding parties. People come from all around to sit and hand feed them! I sat for hours that day!

wow. I am envious. You went to a park and had them eat out of your hand. That is adorable. I love these little miracles.