BASICS


BASICS: "Hummingbirds.....where is the person, I ask, who, on observing this glittering fragment of the rainbow, would not pause, admire, and turn his mind with reverence..." (J. J. Audubon).
This is a blog about my summer life at the Baiting Hollow Hummingbird Sanctuary, at my winter garden, Calypso, in the Bahamas, and aspects of life in general.
This private sanctuary is now permanently closed to the general public, as a result of a lawsuit brought by a neighbor. Only my friends and personal guests may visit (paul.adams%stonybrook.edu).

Saturday, December 5, 2015

Great Videos, though not from Baiting Hollow

Here I provide links to several Youtube vids not taken by me. First up, a short vid showing a rufous wintering in Alabama. You can see she's almost identical to LaLa, the rufous currently wintering at the Baiting Hollow Sanctuary. However, the one in Alabama does show a small patch of red on the throat. Despite this the movie says it's a she, and this is probably correct. Mine has no red spot, and is presumably a juvenile. The rufous is the hummingbird migration champion, breeding in Alaska and wintering in central america, and covering a distance of 4000 miles. They are also considered the most aggressive of US hummingbirds. These 2 facts might partly account for why they show up on the east coast in winter - even as far north as Long Island.

Many of my readers will have already seen the wonderful "Nature" video "Hummingbirds: Magic in the Air" -


I recently came across an equally good one, "Jewelled Messengers", presented by "National Geographic" and beautifully narrated by David Attenborough: 


                                    

The sequence starting at 23.00 is particularly striking- it shows the courtship dance of the tiny Wire-Crested ThornTail, which is found in Ecuador and Peru. 

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