s.ngm/2007/01/hummingbirds/img/hummingbird-flower-615.jpg A few months ago, my family and I moved into a new home near Charlottesville, NC and a good friend gave us the best housewarming gift ever: a hummingbird feeder. It doesnt require much, just a place to hang it and as simple solution consisting of one cup of sugar to 4 cups of water. But the return on the investment is large. Hummingbirds are a joy to watch. They are also opportunistic feeders. Once they discover whats on offer, they are there all the time, a continual source of enchantment. With an ordinary feeder you might get bored with the same birds day after day-or grow tired of the cold war with the local squirrel population. But hummingbirds never cease to delight. These are not just the worlds smallest birds. They are the smallest warm-blooded creatures on the planet. The largest of the species-the Giant Hummingbird, weighs 7/10ths of an ounce; the smallest-the Cuban Bee Hummingbird, just 7/100ths. They are marvels of miniaturization. Hummingbird nests are the size of half a walnut shell. A penny will almost cover the inside diameter. The two eggs in a typical clutch are the size of tic-tacs. And there is a good reason these birds spend so much of their time a my feeder. They have the highest metabolic rate of any creature on earth. Hummingbirds live their lives on the brink of starvation. They are able to store only enough energy to survive overnight. Consider...a hummingbird flaps its wings up to 200 times a second. It takes up to 300 breaths a minute. Its resting heart rate is 600 beats a minute and when a hummer flies, its heart may beat twice that fast. Since they burn calories so furiously, hummingbirds must constantly refuel, often consuming more than twice their weight in small insects and nectar each day. A hungry hummer may visit more than 2,000 flowers between dawn and dusk. (This constant search is why it doesnt take them long to discover a new feeder.) Hummingbirds are fliers par excellence, moving up to 35 mph and diving at nearly 60 mph. They can hover precisely for long periods of time, balancing perfectly, as if floating. No other bird can fly backwards! Youd imagine that a creature that weighs a fraction of an ounce, has a tiny beak and dines on nectar is a cream puff. Not so. Hummingbirds are highly territorial and protect their food supply with ferocity. I witness aerial dogfights in my backyard everyday in the summer. Hummers wont hesitate to dive bomb other birds, butterflies-even unsuspecting humans who wander too close to the feeder. And the little buggers are fearless! With the days growing shorter, the hummingbirds are already gone. By late October, they have begun a nearly 2,000 mile migration to central america. That includes a 500 mile marathon over open water, (the Gulf of Mexico). Thats an 18 hour ordeal with no place to stop and nowhere to feed until landfall. Ranging only from Alaska to the Andes, these are distinctly american birds. If you live east of the Mississippi, the ones you see outside your window are all ruby-throats, (only the males have the characteristic markings). But youll find several other species-of the nearly 350 known to exist-in the western united states. On a trip to Telluride a few summers ago, a friend invited me over to his house one afternoon. Just beyond his back patio, he had strung a long line of hummingbird feeders. A great cloud of multi-colored hummers swarmed around us, glittering in the sun. It was like entering wonderland...I could hardly pay attention to the conversation. Of course, hummingbirds have captivated men and women for a long time. A Mayan legend says the hummingbird is actually the sun in disguise, here to court the moon! The Aztecs believed that every hummingbird was the spirit of a fallen warrior and when early spanish explorers encountered them, they called them joyas voladores, flying jewels. Hummingbirds have often captured the imagination of poets, too.In Ode to the Hummingbird, Pablo Neruda rhapsodizes about a: Flying spark of water, Incandescent drop of american fire, Flying resume of the jungle, Rainbow of celestial precision, A golden thread, a green bonfire, Small, superlative being...you are a miracle, And you blaze. Whats so great about hummingbirds, really? It depends on whos looking, I suppose. To me hummingbirds are magic in the air. I admire their energy and intensity, their vitality. Theres something irresistible about these tiny creatures, speeding back and forth and then suddenly pulling up in mid-air, shining like an emerald. Hummingbirds are one of natures most eye-catching creations. Testimony that the universe is more mysterious and sublime than it has to be. They are also a small reminder that life is rich, the most beautiful and exotic things cant be owned--and its pretty darn great to be alive! https://google/search?q=images+of+hummingbirds&client=ubuntu&hs=xn2&channel=fs&tbm=isch&imgil=Cn6erpMJLngooM%253A%253B2-0RmJsfiS_ZRM%253Bhttp%25253A%25252F%25252Ffosterparrots%25252Fruby-throated-hummingbirds%25252F&source=iu&pf=m&fir=Cn6erpMJLngooM%253A%252C2-0RmJsfiS_ZRM%252C_&usg=__SuPzBd5xmVxQGieNlNuLMKG2ZN8%3D&biw=1215&bih=710 Beyond Wealth Alexander Green
Posted on: Sat, 06 Dec 2014 20:03:01 +0000
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