The Mayans believed hummingbirds were the sun in disguise. This idea makes real the intensity of hummingbirds. They are barely more substantial than a 2.5g penny, yet it is hard to miss them when they are around. The first hint of their presence is often the whirring of their wings. Their energy is a buoy. Gravity swirls away in the vortices of their wings. To experience this lift, all you need to do is plant flowers that suit them, along with a few trees and shrubs.
People have long been fascinated by hummingbirds. J. Hector St. John de Crevecoeur described them on his farm in the eastern United States in 1782.
"On this little bird, nature has profusely lavished her most splendid colors; the most perfect azure, the most beautiful gold, the most dazzling red, are forever in contrast and help to embellish the plumes of his majestic head. The richest pallet of the most luxuriant painter could never invent a thing to be compared to the variegated tints with which this insect bird is arrayed. Its bill is as long and as sharp as a coarse sewing needle; like the bee, nature has taught it to find out in the calix of flowers and blossoms, those mellifluous particles that serve it for sufficient food, and yet it seems to leave them untouched, undeprived of anything that our eyes can possibly distinguish. When it feeds, it appears as if immoveable, though continually on the wind; and sometimes, from what notices I know not, it will tear and lacerate flowers into a hundred pieces: for, strange to tell, they are the most irascible of the feathered tribe. Where do passions find room in so diminutive a body?"
Hummingbirds are masters of the air. They move with fluid grace, twisting and turning, sliding forward and back, and up and down, as they work their beloved flowers. They are a living flame fashioned from nectar.
The Ruby-throated hummingbirds visiting my yard this time of year are fashioned from Scarlet Bee Balm, Cardinal Flower, and Anise Hyssop. Other plants that provide food for hummingbirds include Trumpet Creeper, Jewelweed, Wild Columbine, Canada Lily, and native Penstemon.
Anise Hyssop is also a versatile culinary herb. For more details, see Odessa Pipers' Ode to Anise Hyssop. (Scroll ⅔ of the way down the page to find it.)
Hummingbird feeders are another option for attracting them to your yard. Cornell's introduction to hummingbird feeders is a good resource.
Hummingbirds also eat insects and tree sap. Ruby-throated hummingbirds may time their spring migration to coincide with Yellow-bellied sapsucker migration so that they may take advantage of the weeping holes the sapsuckers leave behind. This enables them to have access to tree sap in early spring when flowers are scarce. Despite being common - there are an estimated 34 million hummingbirds in the US and Canada - there is much we do not know about their lives.
"One of the most important areas for future work is that of population biology. Little is known about birth and death rates; no data are available on annual and lifetime reproductive success. Because hummingbirds are difficult to survey, there is little information on Ruby-throated hummingbird densities in various parts of its range; better means to survey populations and track population trends are needed. Data based mostly on occurrences at feeders are anecdotal and inadequate for gauging population numbers and trends. New technologies may offer better opportunities to study daily activity ranges, feeding rates, and local population densities." - Scott Weidensaul et al.
Hummingbirds are mysterious. For one thing, they are tetrachromats, which means they can see entirely different dimensions of color than us. We can see about one percent of the colors they can see. According to Ed Yong, in his book An Immense World, Ruby-throated hummingbirds see grurple, yurple, rurple, and ultra-purple.
Their songs are mysterious, too. Parts of some hummingbird songs occur in the ultrasonic frequency range. This high-frequency song was considered beyond the range that hummingbirds can hear. New research has documented that at least some hummingbirds can hear ultrasonic frequencies. The prevailing theory is that they use high frequencies to communicate in the noisy environment of the rainforest.
I went to bed thinking about hummingbirds, and they entered my dreams and the mysterious reckoning of REM. What emerged was a dream about warm weather bringing tropical plants to the Midwest followed by a great diversity of beautiful hummingbirds. Now, when I walk through my garden, I am surrounded by many manifestations of the sun.
The hummingbird
in flight
is a water-spark,
an incandescent drop
of American
fire,
the jungle's
flaming résumé,
a heavenly,
precise
rainbow:
the hummingbird is
an arc,
a golden
thread,
a green
bonfire!
Oh
tiny
living
lightning,
when
you hover
in the air,
you are
a body of pollen,
a feather
or hot coal,
I ask you:
What is your substance?
And from where do you originate?
Perhaps during the blind age
of the Deluge,
within fertility's
mud,
when the rose
crystallized
in an anthracite fist,
and metals matriculated,
each one in
a secret gallery
perhaps then
from a wounded reptile
some fragment rolled,
a golden atom,
the last cosmic scale,
a drop of terrestrial fire
took flight,
suspending your splendor,
your iridescent,
swift sapphire.
You doze
on a nut,
fit into a diminutive blossom;
you are an arrow,
a pattern,
a coat-of-arms,
honey's vibrato, pollen's ray;
you are so stouthearted —
the falcon
with his black plumage
does not daunt you:
you pirouette,
a light within the light,
air within the air.
Wrapped in your wings,
you penetrate the sheath
of a quivering flower,
not fearing
that her nuptial honey
may take off your head!
From scarlet to dusty gold,
to yellow flames,
to the rare
ashen emerald,
to the orange and black velvet
of your girdle gilded by sunflowers,
to the sketch
like
amber thorns,
your Epiphany,
little supreme being,
you are a miracle,
shimmering
from torrid California
to Patagonia's whistling,
bitter wind.
You are a sun-seed,
plumed
fire,
a miniature
flag
in flight,
a petal of
silenced nations,
a syllable
of buried blood,
a feather
of an ancient heart,
submerged.
Ode to a Hummingbird, Pablo Neruda
Thank you Bill, your photos and essay deeply bring honor to hummingbirds. Beauty and magic. Poetry in motion. Banding research has shown they often return to the same place every year, or where they were born. Some studies have shown they even have human facial recognition ! I believe they do. We’ve come to think of them as friends. Flying from their winter home in Central America, to join us in VT. I share our own anecdotal evidence.Late spring, for the past 17 yrs ‘our’ tiny Ruby throats’ fly in just about the same time we open our camp. A female comes right up to our open window, hovers there, and with her squeaks, she scolds us for not having the feeder ready on arrival.
Our communications continue throughout the summer. Though we have an abundance of flowers, we are always reprimanded for an empty feeder. Just this morning, I heard my husband talking to someone outside on our deck; “I know, I’m eating breakfast, then I’ll fill the feeder, ok?” Seeing there are just the two of us, I took a peek outside, about 2’ from his face , was the female Ruby throat squeaking her request. She flew to the feeder about 5’ away , then returned to her spot in front of him. Repeating this twice. If she could, she would have pointed her wing. They allow us a ‘front row’ view. I can stand a foot from the feeder and I am ignored. A week ago, my husband slowly reached out , and ever so gently, with one finger, stroked it from head to tail as she drank. She didn’t seem to notice until she turned to look at him, eyes widening slightly, and flew off. As we move closer to their departure , I thank them for choosing our humble abode and wish them a safe journey. And a “ we’ll be waiting for you next year”.
“You doze on a nut,fit into a diminutive blossom;you are an arrow,a pattern, a coat-of-arms…”
Thank you for the amazing articles you prepare. They provide me with knowledge and insight to appreciate nature even more.