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Post by Phalon on Apr 9, 2011 20:14:22 GMT -6
What a great video! Those little birds are amazing.
I had a similar experience quite a few times last year, Stepper. I don't put up hummingbird feeders (I don't like to deal with the ants they attract), but for the last couple of years, a little hummingbird makes his morning rounds at the same time I'm out on the porch with my coffee. First he'd go to the flower boxes, and then fly up to the hanging basket of tuberous begonias. I'd see him nearly every day that first year, and again last year. I guess he got used to me sitting there and would stop and hover right in front of my face, just as you described.
I always wanted to reach up and hold out my finger to see if he'd land on it, but I not dare move, let alone even breathe for the disappointment of scaring him away. Maybe this year, I'll be brave enough to try.....and maybe he'll be brave enough to land. Oh-my-gosh, that would be sooo cool.
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Post by stepper on Apr 9, 2011 23:12:17 GMT -6
If you can get it used to you being there, then it might be possible to pull that off. Or maybe hold a feeder while you are sipping coffee and let him get used to coming to you that way. Good luck - and plan on pictures! That'd be something you want to remember!
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Post by Phalon on Apr 10, 2011 6:46:35 GMT -6
Coffee, feeder, camera....got it. Hey, how's that going to be possible? It means I might have to...<gulp>...actually set my coffee cup down for a couple of seconds.
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Post by stepper on Apr 10, 2011 18:57:54 GMT -6
First, it'll take at least some time before you have an actual visitation. But knowing your patience you'll probably swing it. Setting down the coffee - that might not be necessary. My camera has a trip wire - a plunger you hang on to that will trip the camera when you push the the plunger. See? It'll be easy!
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Post by Siren on Apr 11, 2011 21:13:38 GMT -6
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Post by Phalon on Apr 14, 2011 4:59:42 GMT -6
Isn't that cool, Siren. Hubs said he read somewhere that when the second baby hatched, the site got so many hits it crashed for a bit.
BP had it up Monday night, and I got a first real good look at all the babies together. The mom (BP said it was the Mom; I can't tell the difference) was feeding them a fish. At first I thought, "Oh no! She's completely ignoring the smallest one!", but then the little guy nudged his way front and center, and got her attention.
The dad(?) then returned to the nest, and took over keeping them warm while the mom flew away. It wasn't long before he started squawking in a very weird kind of way..."BP!!! What's he doing?!"
"Oh, he doesn't like to sit in the nest. He's calling the mom back."
Sure enough, the mom returned.....and she had what looked like a rabbit that she and the dad ate themselves. It was amazing.....and all took place in about 10 or 15 minutes.
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Post by stepper on Apr 15, 2011 21:03:41 GMT -6
I haven't seen anything except after the fact - nothing while it was actually going on. Sigh. Why is it that everything that falls into the carnivorous category picks on bunnies? I like bunnies!
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Post by Siren on Apr 16, 2011 9:15:36 GMT -6
That is too funny - even in the animal world, dad doesn't like to sit on the nest. Well, too bad, chum. You think mom does? Sorry about the bunny, Step. My nieces love bunnies, too. For some reason, they think jackrabbits are hilarious. My oldest niece even collects them. And they each have a t-shirt (courtesy of Aunt Siren) from South Dakota State University, home of the Fighting Jacks:
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Post by stepper on Apr 16, 2011 14:30:48 GMT -6
Jackrabbits are cool! Fleet footed little f... never mind. I'm glad Aunt Siren got her nieces such nifty T- shirts.
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Post by stepper on Apr 19, 2011 17:33:38 GMT -6
Actually, there's an easy cure for that problem. Plain 'ole regular Crisco cooking oil. Oil. The feeders usually hang via a plastic coated hanger, but what ever you are using to hang up the feeder, try this. Get a paper towel and soak a corner, then coat the hanger with the Crisco oil. Don't put the hanger out of reach because a couple times during the year you'll want to do this again, but that's it. Just coat the hanger with Crisco. I guess the Crisco gets tacky and the ants have trouble getting past it - they certainly don't like it. Eventually the oil will pretty much dry out and discolor. Just recoat the hanger, or clean it up, dry it off, and start fresh. I know from personal experience that this works on the ants we have down here.
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Post by Mini Mia on Apr 20, 2011 18:24:18 GMT -6
Vaseline will work too. Anything tacky/greasy.
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Post by katina2nd on Apr 20, 2011 20:52:54 GMT -6
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Post by stepper on Apr 21, 2011 19:47:40 GMT -6
Neat story Kat! Thanks!
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Post by Phalon on Apr 22, 2011 21:19:56 GMT -6
Aw, pats on the head to Tonka, poor guy.
Been meaning to get back to this, and Joxie's Vaseline suggestion....
Before I switched to safflower seed - which squirrels hate - we used to have a horrible time with squirrels in the bird feeders. They not only ate all the sunflower seeds, but actually gnawed through the feeders to get at the seeds faster. Hubs resorted to greasing the poles the feeders hung from to keep the squirrels from climbing them (it worked for a while, until eventually, they figured they could continually hurl themselves at the feeders until they knocked them to the ground).
I'm not sure what he used to grease the poles - cooking oil, motor oil, automotive grease, WD40, maybe? Whatever it was, ants by the hundreds stuck to it. Bluck!
Switching to safflower seed was a good idea in more ways than one.
Maybe the ants in our yard are more tenacious? As long as the hummingbirds come to my hanging baskets and flower boxes, I don't think I'll try the oil thing on a hummingbird feeder just yet. Thanks for the suggestions, though.
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Post by stepper on Apr 22, 2011 23:29:01 GMT -6
I've had a few ant's that would get stuck, but it wasn't a severe problem - not like you seem to have been dealing with. Mostly, they ended up avoiding it. But, what ever works for you is fine. The point is to have the hummers come visiting.
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Post by Phalon on May 20, 2011 21:25:18 GMT -6
My hummingbird is back! I've seen more than a few of them at work in the last couple of weeks, but was missing my guy at home. He's returned, though. I saw him twice this evening, hovering around the azalea, which is in full bloom by the front porch. A little later, Hubs was sitting on the porch, and the hummer came right up to his face and stayed for a few seconds before flying back to the azalea.
I wonder if they're creatures of habit, and this hummingbird really is the same one that came by the front porch every morning for the last couple of years. It'd be neat if it was him; it's just like the return of an old friend.
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Post by stepper on May 21, 2011 17:53:18 GMT -6
Congratulations! My SIL has them out in the country too. They like her plants.
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Post by Phalon on May 22, 2011 21:03:40 GMT -6
Don't you know when I sat on the porch this morning, I didn't see him once. I'm sure it was because I had the camera ready!
I did see a cute little bird gathering dandelion fluff though - quite a mouthful it had. Probably to line a nest, I'm guessing.
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Post by stepper on May 23, 2011 21:38:07 GMT -6
He'll be back I'm sure. Do watch in the evenings too? Around dusk was my best view time here.
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Post by Phalon on May 24, 2011 6:27:53 GMT -6
Yeah, late afternoon was when I saw him the first time this year, and evening was when he got all up in Hubs’ face. Most evenings – lately, anyway – I’m too busy with other stuff to sit on the porch and wait. Mornings, with my coffee, is typically my porch sitting time.
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Post by Siren on May 24, 2011 6:39:39 GMT -6
My mom has several Hummers buzzing around her feeders these days. They're often quite hateful to each other. Though she has several feeders, they all want to drink from the same one.
My cousin who runs that beautiful guest ranch in Colorado also has hummingbird feeders. The black bears often visit and tip the feeders into their mouths for a drink. I guess it's like bear KoolAid. One of my most unique experiences was gazing at one of those bears through a window as he drank from the feeder just outside. He was probably four feet from me. Looked me right in the eyes, and then turned his attention back to the feeder.
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Post by Mini Mia on May 24, 2011 17:58:19 GMT -6
See, we don't have any really big wild animals here. And when mention of turning loose some wild bears on a reserve several hours away from here reached my ears, I was totally against it. I don't mind the raccoons, the opossums, the skunks, the fox, or the deer wandering around in my yard, but bear I do not want. I hear bobcats and coyote every now and again, but I rarely see them in my yard.
Now, if I had grown up in bear country, they might not bother me, but I didn't, and the thought of them running around out here scares me to no end. I like going outside without having to check to see if the coast is clear.
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Post by stepper on May 24, 2011 20:50:06 GMT -6
For me, it's a panther. A truly impressive kitty if ever there was one, but hearing one meow at you while you are in the woods - and you realize you're not at the zoo - that gets your attention. Seriously.
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Post by Mini Mia on May 24, 2011 20:52:22 GMT -6
Ooh, yeah. Don't want no panthers or mountain lions or any big cats around here neither.
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Post by Phalon on May 25, 2011 5:06:04 GMT -6
I've seen humming birds display that hateful behavior too. We have a very large smokebush in the yard - it's a gigantic thing that is probably 50 years old, and approximately 15 feet tall and just as wide. When it flowers it's a big cloud of 'smokey' plumes. The hummers love it....and they fight over the plumes. You'd think with 15 feet of flowers, they'd have plenty of choices for each of them find their own flower. Instead, they dive bomb each other, trying to drive competitors away.
Oh, what a cool and fun thing to see! From behind glass, of course!
Like Joxie, we don't have bears around this far south in Michigan. There were plenty of times I've seen them though. When we were kids, we'd go camping at least a couple of times each summer. The bears were very prevalent up north. I remember one time, my dad drove us to a dump (back when they had dumps) at dusk to watch the bears come out and feed. You would have thought it was a drive-in movie, there were so many cars full of spectators. Every one parked a safe distance away from the pile of garbage - about a football field's length, I'm guessing. There was one idiot, though, who got out of his car and starting walking toward the bears to get a closer view.
I was just a little kid, but I remember how loud it was when people starting honking their horns, to either let the guy know he was putting himself in extreme danger, or to scare the bears away. The bears didn't budge from their nightly meal, but thankfully the guy finally turned around and got back in his car. Watching wildlife you don't often see is fun, educational, and a memorable experience for most people. But there is a reason it's called wildlife. I wonder if that guy thought he was approaching Yogi Bear instead of a wild animal with unpredictable behavior.
I'm just glad my childhood experience of seeing the bears feasting didn't include watching them feast on a man!
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Post by stepper on May 25, 2011 21:25:43 GMT -6
You were probably just bearly old enough to be there and I'm sure observing such a grizzly scene would have polorized your opinon of all woodland creatures. (I wonder if writing that would be pandering?)
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Post by Phalon on May 26, 2011 6:20:05 GMT -6
HA! It certainly would not have been a Kodiak moment, for sure.
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Post by stepper on May 26, 2011 17:47:46 GMT -6
I'm sure you are right Phalon. But if I'd had a camera, I would have experienced a brown out and the pictures would have been black from lack of light.
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Post by Phalon on May 26, 2013 5:53:18 GMT -6
Whew!! <a sigh of relief>
For over a month we've been watching a pair of Canadian geese on the irrigation pond at work. At first, there were two pair sharing the pond - one on either side. They didn't share nicely though, constantly fighting in the middle of the water, creating quite a ruckus with their loud honking and flapping of wings. One pair left after about a week of battling, and the winners settled in to nest.
This has been a yearly ritual for the past five or so springs. The geese come, build a nest, and leave rather quickly. There's either too much commotion around the pond which is bordered by service roads on all sides. The pond separates the retail area from the back 40 restock areas; the roads are busy with semis, front-end loaders, John Deere Gators, and our big delivery trucks. If it's not the vehicle commotion that gets to them, it's raccoons or coyotes that get the eggs.
This was a tenacious pair though. The nest was never unattended. We're not sure if it was the mother that sat there the entire month or they switched places, but one goose was always on the nest, while the other guarded it - and guarded it quite well. It would stand in the middle of the road, daring you to advance the vehicle, so you'd have to slowly inch forward until finally it would move to the side, glaring at you as you passed.
We thought about putting up 'proceed with caution' signs around the pond, in case unknowing customers wandered out there. 'We don't always find the body', you know.
Thursday was a normal goose day. Friday morning, my boss and I drove a Gator out back to take some rhodos to our sold area, and saw the male(?) goose standing on the opposite bank from the nest. Driving back around the pond, we saw the nest empty, and the other goose nowhere in sight.
It was an extremely busy day, and restock had to be done periodically - each time someone went out there to load up a trailer, they'd report back that the lone goose was still standing on the bank opposite the nest. Each time a report came over the radios, hope faded. The nest remained empty the entire day, without sign of the second goose.
At close of business, we could stand it no longer, and a co-worker and I ventured out to look at the nesting spot - something no one had done the entire past month to give them as much privacy as possible. We were afraid of what we'd find.
We found nothing. No egg shells, no feathers, not even any goose poop (if you've ever been around Canadian geese, you know they poop everywhere). There wasn't really even what could be considered a nest - just a big flattened area of daylilies where the goose sat for the past month. Perplexing. We figured whatever animal got the goose and eggs, did a pretty damned good job cleaning up.
Saturday morning: Goose back on the nest. Other goose standing guard. No sign of any goslings, though.
Wonder if they're starting over? Or was the lone male on Friday, standing guard over his brood, hidden somewhere along the banks?
At least the mom is safe.
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Post by Mini Mia on May 26, 2013 20:39:21 GMT -6
Ooh. Sounds like a good place to set up an internet camera.
Glad momma goose is okay. Hope the babies are okay too.
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