Posted: 7/14/2005 5:51:27 PM EDT
|
Yesterday it was an albino fawn, today it's a series of great pics of baby hummingbirds. Everyone who knows me is familiar with my love of everything in the out-of-doors, so I'm often sent things like this via e-mail. Follow the pages of this: community.webtv.net/Velpics/HUM Ain't nature grand?? 
|
AMEN, Brother !!!! Actually, more on-topic, I've always wondered where hummingbirds come from. I mean, I get them in my back yard around August, but I have no idea where they are for the rest of the year??  Do they migrate - it seems like they need to eat a lot to stay alive, so I don't imagine they have time/energy to migrate. But if they don't, then where the heck do they go? Maybe they live underground - in vast hummingbird burrows?  Or only live for a month, and then lay eggs that don't hatch for 11 months??  Seriously - that's always puzzled me. |
Indeed. Humming birds are a fascinating creature. A few years ago I watch one of the specie of Humming Bird that lives here in AZ performing his mating ritual for a female. He would hover in front of her then dart up about 40' then dive. Then just before he hit the ground he would chirp quite loudly then go straight back up and hover in front of the female again. It was magnificent. Growing up in MO I once watched a Garder Snake kill a Copperhead. Once the melee was over the Garder Snake started eating milkweeds. One other time when I was out varmint calling here in AZ, it started to rain. It wasn't a heavy rain to start so I decided to sit it out for a while. As the rain became more heavy I noticed movement in the sand near a stone by my right foot as if something underneath was moving. I watched for a few more minutes and eventually a Sand Lizard emerged. He rested his head against the rock and stuck out his tongue to capturing the first drop of rain water that rolled off that particular rock. I am reading a good book right now called The Blind Watchmaker by Richard Dawkins. I just thought I'd mention it. |
Hummingbirds are migratory. Some of them make several thousand mile annual migrations. Some Ruby Throated hummingbirds migrate ACROSS the entire Gulf of Mexico each year. Pretty amazing for a creatures that weighs about as much as a large paperclip. |
|
Great pics!! We have several hummingbirds that come back here every year to the feeder & the plants my daughter puts out for them. It's amazing how close they will get to you when they feed. My daughter & I both have held out flowers & had them feed on them at arms length. It's also really cool watching them play, dive bombing each other while taking turns drinking from the feeder. ____________________________________ The only hope you have is to accept the fact that you are already dead. And the sooner you accept that, the sooner you will be able to function as a soldier is supposed to function, without mercy, without compassion, without remorse. |
Wow! I did not think they'd be able to do that! That just makes them even more amazing, and a treat to see. Here are two (crappy) pics I took last year of a hummingbird hovering in flight in my back yard.   |
Wow--I guess that would be a ruby-throated hummer, but I've never seen one that close. Very cool!! 
|
lol looks like its wearing a tin foil hat. |
It'll fit right in at arfcom. 
|
They're not playing, they're fighting. Pound for pound, hummingbirds are the most vicious animals on the planet. IIRC, "Smithsonian" magazine had an article discussing this within the last 2-3 years. Good read if you can find the issue; most libraries stock it. |
I've noticed that with the hummingbirds I get in my back year every year. They particularly like the butterfly bushes I have in the back yard, and I've seen one tiny bird "defend" a giant bush (the size of a minivan) from any and all other hummingbirds, so he could have it all to himself. Hilarious - but definitely aggressive birds. |
Bush sends the spaceship to take them all to florida for the winter, when you're asleep.  |
I KNEW IT !!!! That makes much more sense than all this migratory gobbledygook people are trying to fool me with!!
|
They stay at Marriott's. They have award points there. and Marriott has a no "cat" policy. HAHA! |
Unfortunately though, since you now KNOW this............. 
|
| Hummingbirds are cool. We have a feeder on our patio and it's fun to watch all the different types of hummingbirds that come to it. Yes, those are some mean little critters. Each one thinks that they are the only one entitled to the feeder. I have two feeders but I haven't gotten around to putting the second one up. The other day two birds were going at each other so intensely that they slammed into the window. Didn't hurt them a bit. |
Didn't know that, thanks for the info. ____________________________________ The only hope you have is to accept the fact that you are already dead. And the sooner you accept that, the sooner you will be able to function as a soldier is supposed to function, without mercy, without compassion, without remorse. |
Very cool. Hummingbirds are birds perfected. With speed and agility like that they are natures F-22. |
PURE EVIL| We have a couple of hummingbirds that we really enjoy watching. CnL took these pics on our front porch last week. |
Nature did not do it. God did. |
Thanks for that really important clarification. It really added to the thread. |