Hummingbirds, no not the fish locator type

bassman284

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I live in East Tennessee and haven't seen a humming bird for the last few days. I'll leave the feeder out for a few more days. I agree, they sure do like to fight :lol:
I'm in Iowa and I've seen more of them than usual the past week or so. A couple of them were so fat I can't believe their little wings kept them up. I'll leave mine up until at least the end of the month. Unless it snows.
 

gm280

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I'm in Iowa and I've seen more of them than usual the past week or so. A couple of them were so fat I can't believe their little wings kept them up. I'll leave mine up until at least the end of the month. Unless it snows.

Yea, we do have some huge bird now. Some look too fat to fly. But we only have females. The males must have flew the coop already. :pound:

We still have a lot of birds, but less then a week ago. Still looks like a crazy airport around the feeders, but some how they don't fly into each other. :eek:
 

WIMUSKY

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I need to take mine down. They're gone. The red nectar has even turned pink. Must be separating from the water....
 

gm280

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I need to take mine down. They're gone. The red nectar has even turned pink. Must be separating from the water....

WIMUSKY, ours doesn't sit long enough to go pink. They are still consuming like crazy. But not nearly as much as a few weeks ago. So they are also leaving our area a little at a time. There probably only feeding on a quart a day now, not a gallon or even a half gallon like they were.
 

BWR1953

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A new female just now showed up here. She's larger and more mature looking than the juvenile female that left here a few days ago. She fed on my wife's flowers and didn't bother with the feeder. At least so far.
 

bassman284

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The bees took over my feeder this morning so I guess the hummingbirds won't be back. I haven't seen one for about 3 days anyway.
 

BWR1953

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We've had a couple of new females passing through. They don't bother with the feeder at all and just use the flowers.

It was funny watching them fighting the 15-20mph breeze during hurricane Matthew the other day. :lol:
 

gm280

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We still have a few but for the most part, the majority of them seem to have left. But with at least three that I know of for sure, we have to keep ours up yet. Won't be long now tough.
 

gm280

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Well I finally think our birds have flew the coop for this season. I haven't see even one bird in the last two to three days. I will leave the feeders up for a time more just in case. But I think it is all over for this year now.
 

WIMUSKY

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I need to take my feeder down, the liquid is clear....... They've been gone for a while anyway...

I'll see how many YJs crawled into the feeding holes....
 

gm280

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I need to take my feeder down, the liquid is clear....... They've been gone for a while anyway...

I'll see how many YJs crawled into the feeding holes....

We didn't seem to get many YJs at our feeders. But we did get some honey bees. And those little bees were bold enough to fight off the hummingbirds. It was funny seeing the little bees fly at the birds and make them leave.
 

gm280

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Well I think it is time to take down our hummingbird feeds for this year. We haven't seen a bird in near about two weeks now. And since our temps have been in the 90's during that same time, I can say that temps are what drives them to migrate but available daylight hours. Those little birds have an internal clock that tells them it is time to leave.

One thing I wish I could find is a hummingbird nest. In all the years we've feed these little birds, I've yet to see even one of their nests. I realize their nests are very small, and we do have tons of trees, so one day maybe I'll stumble across one of their nest accidentally. I watched them fly into the trees from the feeders lots of times, but haven't seen where they sleep (for lack of the correct terminology) at night or have their young hatch.

So much for this year. I will see the males return in early early spring like usual.
 

ondarvr

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My hummingbirds are still around, the numbers peaked about a week ago though.
 

BWR1953

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Haven't seen a hummingbird here for a couple weeks or so.

Starting to see the "snowbirds" coming back though. Yellow Throated Vireos, Yellow Throated Warblers, Red Headed Woodpeckers, House Finches, Carolina Chickadees and some others have been showing up.

No Goldfinches yet though. Those are the ones that really hit the feeders here in the cooler months.
 

ondarvr

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The hummingbirds are back in full force, 5 or 6 at a time around the feeder. There are 2 feeders, one is controlled by a very aggressive hummingbird that won't let any other birds feed from it, the other one is crowded most of the time. This aggressive bird has been there for several months, he sits on a perch about a foot from the feeder from morning to night.
 

gm280

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The hummingbirds are back in full force, 5 or 6 at a time around the feeder. There are 2 feeders, one is controlled by a very aggressive hummingbird that won't let any other birds feed from it, the other one is crowded most of the time. This aggressive bird has been there for several months, he sits on a perch about a foot from the feeder from morning to night.

You have hummingbird now? I thought they all flew south when the days got shorter and cold. We won't have any show back up until next spring. Amazing.
 

ondarvr

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I need to bring the feeders in at night or they freeze solid.
 

gm280

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I need to bring the feeders in at night or they freeze solid.

I have to say that is amazing. You need to post a few pictures. Do they have little fur coats and show shoes on?
 

MRS

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Ours freeze but they still use them. Will try to get a photo this weekend.
 
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