I am late this week and apologize. Monday I spent a good part of the day visiting with my longest term old friend. We go back beaucoup years or since I was 11 and she was 9 when we met and hit it off from the first. Oh, we had our spats as kids will but never gave each other up. We drifted off in different directions for a long time but then reconnected, perhaps thru Classmates. Anyway she and her hubby came by from their home farther north and we had a great gab fest. I know him too; he was a high school classmate. They have been together for I think it is 55 years--how awesome is that?
Anyway, Hummingbirds!! Cochise County, where I have lived a total of about 28 years, is the hummingbird capital of the USA. More species are recorded here than anywhere else north of Mexico and Central/South America. They are a western hemisphere species or family and the most amazing little creatures. They are fearless and fierce, beautiful and amazing in the distances they travel with those tiny wings beating thousands of times a minute.
Back when I lived in Whetstone, a communnity about 25 miles south and slightly east of my present home, I began to feed them my first summer there which was 1984. It took a few years before I began to gather large groups of them and slowly came to know the different ones and be able to identify the regular visitors and a few of the rarer ones.
The most prolific among my guests were the Black Chins. In flat light they are gray with black heads for the males and just gray for the females. But in sunlight the males show a purple on their heads and gorget (neck feathers or 'bib') and both have a pale or near white front.
The next most common is the Rufous, the only all red hummingbird I know of. The males have a deep red back that is irridescent in the sun, red wings and a lighter red underneath as well as a red head and gorget or throat patch. The females again are mostly gray with a slight redish cast. They are the most aggressive and possessive ones. A male will 'stake out' a feeder and do his best to run all interlopers off.
You seldom see them before mid to late summer because they fly north by a different route--some as far as Alaska. Then they begin a gradual trek south when the first hints of 'winter' (what they call termination dust in AK or the first little skiff of white on the mountains just below glacier level) and end up here between mid August and Labor Day.
Other types may come and go and pop up suddenly--the White Eared, Blue Throated, Anna's, Allen's and Caliope--the smallest one, barely larger than bumble bee! I cataloged those and a few more a time or two at Whetstone. The Allen's are similar to the Rufous but green backed with deep red in tail and gorget. Males and females of both show the white tipped tail feathers when they fan the tail out as in the aggressive mode.
I coined the term "Hummingbird Summer" at least two decades ago. I was used to a few Black Chins that stayed all season, usually about late March until near Thanksgiving. The season seemed to get longer over the years I lived there, from 1984 to 2008, and once or twice I think one Black Chin may have stayed through the winter as I would see him now and then. Either that or he had found shelter like up in Miller Canyon on the Huachucas and made a scouting trip on a warm day.
Anyway, sometime in August the Rufous and Allens would suddenly show up and the air show was on with squads of them doing all sorts of aerobatics from dawn to dusk, sometimes calling a short truce so several could perch on a feeder at once and tank up. Then by mid September they would begin to slip away until it was back to just the half dozen or so Black Chin regulars.
They had a peculair trait which I am waiting to see/hear this year--maybe. They will fill up, perch somewhere and go into a suspended state, almost catatonic or hypnotized, for up to 24 hours, then fill up again and take off. They fly clear across the Gulf of Mexico in some cases or vast distances down across the Sonora and Chihuahua deserts where food and water are very scarce. How they manage I can hardly imagine but they do. And before this they would often perch and 'sing' this odd little slightly musical ratchety 'tune' that I only heard at that time. I said they were going over the route map in their minds or telling themselves, "I think I can, I thnk I can." I missed that for the years I was in NM and Colorado and there were not nearly as many around. There were quite a few in the Silver City, NM area but nothing like here. So I hope to hear some 'going south' songs come about October. We'll see.
For now I watch the fun and enjoy the busyness of Hummingbird Summer. I'd better put sugar on my shpping list for tomorrow as I will be making lots of 'hummingbird soup' for awhile! I do eight cups of water and two of sugar brought to a strong boil for each batch and fill 2-3 feeders with that mix. Normally they last a week--I empty then if they are not and clean and refill but for a bit it may be every 2-3 days. It's been dry so not many flowers for them to visit. They need the food and have to contend with the bees for it, who are also hungry--or maybe lazy. For sure, Hummingbird Summer is absolutely Arizona to me since I have not observed the phenomenon anywhere else.
All photos mine from Whetstone days.
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| Anna's female? |
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| resting Black Chin |
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| Anna's and Black Chin |
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| Annas and Rufous |
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