Hummingbirds

About dusk I went out on the porch and decided to get a few winks of shuteye......the hummingbirds had other ideas. I suppose my neighbors either have quit feeding them, or have old sour nectar in their feeders, because all of a sudden I have about eight hummer where yesterday only two or three were in residence. The problem with that many hummers, they are NOT social. They are very territorial and the don't take kindly to their neighbors coming over for "tea."

I have one hummingbird that nests here. She has built her nest in the backyard hickory for the past several years. So tonight when the others came she was very distressed. She took a perch on a limb of the Japanese Maple and she stood guard. She was trying to protect her territory and four feeders that she rightfully consider to be her very own. So the back yard was an ariel show of darting, chirping, buzzing hummers. Hummingbirds are not quiet, they make a very high pitched chirping noise, and she was zipping this way and that chirping, batting, sailing, careening and trying her best to out maneuver the other hummers. For all I know she might just have a clutch of eggs in her nest.

No one was getting much to eat....they were doing way to much fighting. It seems that when you have FIVE feeders that at least five could eat. But that isn't the way it works with hummers, the dominant hummers tries to protect them all, no matter how many feeders are present. She was running herself ragged trying to keep the other birds from getting any food. It was comical, but it kept me from getting that nap.

Egrets On The Pond

(a true haiga,hand drawn) wings

against the horizon

take flight