Hummingbird season has begun!

[flowerweaver]

This afternoon the first hummingbird of the season showed up. Right on time, too, as I see in my notes it was exactly one year ago today that the first Black Chin hummingbird arrived. For me, this means Spring has officially begun!

I'll post photos on this thread as the season progresses, so check back. (Meanwhile, here's one from last year)

 

[Smart Red]

Here we expect the first hummer on or around May 1st. I'll have to check the hummingbird migration map to see where the ruby throated hummer has reached so far this spring. It is just getting a foothold in the U.S.

 

[dewdropsinwv]

I can't wait for humming bird season!!!!! They usually show up here around the end of april begining of may

 

[so lucky]

Do you all have problems with other critters stealing the nectar? I have caught raccoons tipping the feeder up like a bottle and swigging the nectar out of the holes. Last summer I had a problem with downy woodpeckers jerking the yellow flower centers out of the feeder, so they can get their fatter beaks in to drink. And of course there are the ants and the bees, but they're expected. Looking forward to hummer season with trepidation, lol.

 

[Ridgerunner]

At least for a while it looks like our freezing weather is done so it is probably time to get out the hummer feeder. I can't remember when I saw the first one last year but they always show up well before they are supposed to. Thanks for the reminder.

 

[so lucky]

Ridge, I usually see the first hummer April 15, then it takes a week or so to see any more. You being a bit south of me, I would think around the first week of April would be about time.
Hey, that's less than 3 weeks away!

 

[flowerweaver]

@so lucky I've only seen a woodpecker at the hummingbird feeder once. How interesting that they took your feeder apart! But in a few short weeks I'll have so many hummingbirds I end up hanging a chicken drinker to accommodate them all, and the orioles use that too.

I have water traps suspended above the regular hummingbird feeders so the ants can't get in. Enough things are blooming now to keep the bees busy. It isn't until late summer my own honeybees will take over the feeders and I have to move them away from the house. For some reason my husband doesn't like entering the back door through a cloud of 100,000 bees! LOL.

Here's the 'Hummingbird Bar' from several years ago. I have to fill it several times a day! But it is unbreakable, easy to clean.

 

[Carol Dee]

WOW @flowerweaver I am so envious of all your Hummingbirds. We do get several ruby throats to visit. They sure are fun. I have two feeders out back and on in front. It is crazy how anyone of them can ever feed with all the squabbles.

 

[flowerweaver]

One thing I learned about them @Carol Dee is that the same birds come back each year to the same feeder, and so do their offspring. I have helped with several hummingbird bandings out here and that's how they know about the repeat customers! So each feeder serves a clan. I think the squabbles come when someone from another clan stops by.

There are a couple Ruby Throats in that last photo, but the last couple years it's been almost entirely Black Chins, whose gorgets flash purple. At one of the bandings we once caught a male that was half Ruby and half Black, with a split gorget, that was a rare sight!

 

[so lucky]

I was pretty sure the same ones come back year after year. I have had them come to my patio door and hover and look in, when they show up before I get the feeder out.