Off The Beaten Path

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Georgia, United States
Some people come into our lives and quickly go. Some people move our souls to dance. They awaken us to new understanding with the passing whisper of their wisdom. Some people make the sky more beautiful to gaze upon. They stay in our lives for awhile, leave footprints on our hearts, and we are never ever the same.

Sunday, April 6

Birth of a Hummingbird


A friend had these photo's sent to him, they were taken over a 24 day period from the egg to the day the babies left the nest. Instead of copying the pictures and posting them, I thought I would just enclose a link to the original site. I don't think many people have had the opportunity to take pictures of the hatching of baby hummingbirds. I almost did once, but the cat got them. The Momma built the next on my Hoya outside on the patio. I guess she didn't see the railing that made it possible for the cat to come within inches of her nest. I watched her sitting on the nest for about a week and then one day the nest was broken and the eggs were on the ground. Sure did make me sad, but a cat will do what a cat will do. It was a very bad place for a nest.

I have one hummingbird who comes here every year. He is the first to come. And he arrived several days ago. I put up my hummingbird feeder yesterday, and he spends most of his day there in the tree right next to his food supply. He seems a bit skinny, so I guess he is carbo loading right now. He will soon fatten up.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thanks for sharing, Nea. We very much enjoyed looking at this! Did you know that there are no Hummingbirds in Hawaii and it is illegal to import them? Hummingbirds are the only pollinators of pineapple plants, and if there were hummingbirds in Hawaii, there would not be seedless pineapple! (Pineapple is a native plant of South America and was brought to Hawaii because of the optimum growing conditions.)

Neoma said...

I did not know that......never thought about seeds in pineapple, because there never are any. haha.....but of course there must have been a pineapple seed at some point.....

I guess the little beggers don't fly that far......or you would have them. I have never lived in a place in the US, that if I put out a feeders, they didn't come within days. Did you have them in Vegas? Or do you know. Kind of dry, but if there are flowers, they will come.

This reminds me of the flowering Almond. I have both varieties, pink and white. They are heirloom, passed down from the original plants that were my Grandmother's, and maybe even her Mother's. We take a start off and pass it through the family. Well when I moved to Louisiana, I asked Mom to send me a shoot, and she did. The next year, she said her plant had died. So she tried to buy another, and found that you cannot buy them in California. It seems that the almond crops in California would soon all go to flowers and have no nuts if they were to cross polinate with the flowering variety, so they have made it illegal to sell them in California. It was lucky that she send me the plant, ot it would have been gone for good. I brought them here to Georgia, and they are growing nicely. We have no such restrictions here.

C... said...

Oh that's great. I have never seen baby hummingbirds. How sweet.

J. Andrew Lockhart said...

I'm like C!

Burfica said...

I have had a family of hummingbirds live in my tree and come back each year. I kept food out for them. But last year not a one showed up. I was soooo sad.

Neoma said...

Hi C, Andrew....they aren't seen that often in the nest. They are pretty timid creatures.....and they aren't in the nest very long.

Hi Burfica, I have one that lives here each year, and has a nest up in the tree just beyond the porch, he comes back every year. I have begun to count on it. But then who knows how long a hummers lives? I don't..??? I usually have five or six here feeding by summers end.