hummingbirds are hugely territorial and will not usually tolerate another bird around. We have a few in the backyard and you can often hear their frantic chirps as they fight each other. Last week I saw a pair just twist around each other and shoot straight up in the air until I couldn't see them anymore(it was like something out of Matrix).
yeah i see them quite a bit do the horseshoe shaped fighting pattern.
it's also their mating pattern, but these were both female.
being august here, and close to the on set of cold weather they are a bit more frantic than normal. i'm not sure if they are immatures or not. i was roughly 6 feet away, with the sigma 105mm macro - set to shutter priority. it was between f:4 and f:6.3
I have a shot in my disk library, from our recent New Mex vacation, where I have 6, possibly 7 hummers in the same shot. It was a restaurant in Cloudcroft with several feeders outside. The humming birds were like a locust infestation, they were so thick. There must have been 50-60 birds fighting for the 7 or 8 feeders. Never seen anything like it. In the meantime, check out my daughter's photos from this same location:
they are crazy birds. if you have them in your yard - try to find the nests. they are about golf ball size - if you find one - before you realize what it is - you'll wonder what the hell the thing you found is, and how it got there.
sadly they will be gone within a few weeks, as well as most of the other birds - barring chicadee, crow & blue jay.
cool - i wasn't trying to say i was the first to get more than one in a shot - just i hadn't seen it before.
i imagine those shots are heavy crops?
I'll have to look at her originals. She was using my 70-200 f4 for these, and the birds were not at all skittish about us getting within 3 or 4 feet of them, so my guess is that Smartypants' shots are not cropped much at all. Amazing!
Nice shots. I've got 8 feeders and I'm clueless as to how many hummingbirds there are total. At this time of the year it's a full time job trying to keep the feeders maintained. lol I'm boiling about 3 quarts of nectar daily. I just bought 10 more pounds of sugar. :(
Pretty good, strangehost. 7 if you count the one through the glass!
These are really cool! I know NOTHING about hummingbirds... Do they live in Louisiana? Around New Orleans? If so, how can I attract them? (Other than planting flowers...) A feeder I'd imagine, are they cheap? Thanks for any info!
never seen that breed - what is it? only ruby throated here.
the feeders are cheap, and so is the food. just you have to be careful about changing the feeder when it is fermented, and the mixture you use to make the food. any hardware store will likely have the feeders. i don't know if they live in LA, but if they live in VT, i imagine they do...
dswebb, The ratio for the nectar is 1 cup sugar to 4 cups water.
Boil two minutes, cool and store in the refrigerator.
I don't add red food coloring...it's not necessary and I've "heard" it's actually harmful to them.
Soup's right. The biggest worry is keeping the feeders clean and changing frequently. Mine never have time to ferment. My birds empty the feeders daily.
Great shots up there ^^^ !! We usually have about 5 hummingbirds but this year we have about 12 regular visitors. I need to get out there and try to get some shots...it's just been too hot! Here are some shots I've taken though.
The worry about the feed going bad is overdone. At 25% sugar content, bacterial growth is seriously inhibited. I replace mine every 2 weeks or so. I do make it a little stronger though (a 1 to 3 ratio) for extra preservative action.
The species in my picture is a Rufous Hummingbird and was taken in the Seatte area. Here's another view...sorry for the big pics, but they are at low res and so shouldn't take much to view.
Hahaha, every two weeks?! Our little hummers would move away if we did that. They've been drinking so much that our THREE medium to large feeders are being replenished every 1 - 1 1/2 days. They are so thirsty with this heat.
Ours often fight too, but now and again the feeders will be full of them...but it doesn't last long before they are dive-bombing each other again. :-)
I've managed to get home early enough four times in the last two weeks to practice on the hummers. Here are some of my attempts so far. They're all shot with a EF 70-200mm f/4 L.
