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Broad-billed Hummer (Sunday)
- To: carolinabirds@duke.edu
- Subject: Broad-billed Hummer (Sunday)
- From: Joshua Stuart Rose <jsr6@duke.edu>
- Date: Mon, 19 Nov 2001 13:45:50 -0500 (EST)
- Sender: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu
Hi Carolinabirders,
Shantanu Phukan and I saw the Broad-billed Hummingbird at Monte Tickle's
house yesterday at roughly 10:40 AM. Sorry neither of us posted sooner,
we were both a little sleep-deprived (and yet neither of us got to see
the Leonids!). Actually, we're kind of relying on faith in Susan C. for
the identification; Shantanu said he could only tell that it was some
kind of hummingbird, and I could go only slightly beyond that and confirm
that it was mostly green.
We had just arrived at the house and were introducing ourselves to Ms.
Tickle when I heard a suspicious chipping call very different from the
Yellow-rumped Warblers all around us. I turned to scan the trees, and the
little bugger zipped in at the feeder behind us. It quickly zipped up
into the trees; I had one or two good naked-eye looks at it perched in
some twigs, but it was gone before we could get our binoculars on it.
And, as Les Todd already noted, it never came back. We did get a thrill
as something flew in and hovered over the garden pond, but it turned out
to be a dragonfly...
Some tidbits that you may not already know: apparently the bird has been
visiting its present location for FIVE WEEKS!! Ms. Tickle forgot to take
her feeder down in September, and then last month a new hummer appeared
long after her regulars had left. She kept feeding it, but didn't contact
anyone (she's a beginning birder, and not on Carolinabirds) until the
weather got cold and she became concerned for its survival. She says it
visited every 15 minutes or so during the recent cold spell, but became
far less regular when things warmed up again.
Anyway, her yard is a very birdy spot. There was near-constant activity
in the surrounding trees. Shantanu and I noted 22 bird species, including
the hummer, in about an hour and a half in the morning; we returned after
a lengthy search for lunch (found some Thai food in Greensboro) to find
Les Todd and some other birders waiting, and noted about seven or eight
more species in the yard. We also saw a Red-tailed Hawk in the big
hayfield along 70, and an accipiter not too far up the road from Ms.
Tickle's house. She supplied us all with hot chocolate right before
Shantanu and I had to leave.
Good birding,
Josh
Joshua S. Rose
Duke University
Department of Biology (Zoology, R.I.P.)
jsr6@duke.edu
http://www.duke.edu/~jsr6/