Eggs Hatched!

I'm calling the female Bahama Woodstar hummingbird that's nesting in a casuarina tree "Cassie". Her eggs have finally hatched and she's busy feeding the tiny babies (probably 2 of them).

Hummers in the Bahamas

Since Christmas I've been at our winter place "Calypso" on the Bahamian island of Eleuthera, and have rather neglected this blog. I see hummingbirds here every day - the local variety known as the Bahama Woodstar, which is even smaller than the ruby-throat, though rather similar in appearance and behavior. However, the male's throat is purple rather than red:

Yesterday, march 2, I spotted an active nest, about 12 feet off the ground in a casuarina tree:

The mother seems to be incubating eggs. Here are more videos, shot today march 3:

summer hummer close-up; climbing roses

It froze at the sanctuary and a number of flowers are dead, but some are still hanging on, though I think the predicted Thanksgiving deep-freeze will finish them off. I'm planting more antique climbing roses at the base of the little cherry-trees, after having grown them on from tiny plants  in pots throughout the summer on the deck, away from the depredations of the numerous deer. Now they are big enough to train up the tree-trunks. Then I wrap them up in chicken wire cages. I now have at least 20 climbing up cherry-trees, and in mid-june (and only then) they put on quite a show. Here's another clip of a hummer feeding at Black-and-Blue, this time closer-up (or is it close-upper?).

Late, and very late.

I thought this was my last hummer of the season (filmed oct 12)

But then, after a long gap, this ruby-throat showed up on nov 4:

I've not see it since but then I've not been much at the sanctuary recently.

Still Some Hummers

I shot these clips on sunday october 7. The first one is in 4K

and this one the day before

Monarch Madness

Lots of monarchs here at the moment:

Posing Nicely

Shrimp Plant perching, feeding

This hummer often perches near a feeder at the extreme northwest corner of the garden, overlooking Long Island Sound and the beach far below. I often live-stream this view (at https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCvTj9WdD0zItyBLI6m-U9Og/live?&ab_channel=FredSmith and at facebook.com/bhhummingbird) but the live-streams are of poor quality/resolution (often only 360P) because of my limited internet bandwidth. So here's a short clip of this area filmed with my handheld SONY camcorder. At first the hummer is perching on a twig of the shrimp plant, he then feeds at a couple of the flowers, then at the feeder, and finally I zoom out to show the view.

Hummer-Canna Close-Up; Visiting

Here's a close-up view of a hummer feeding at canna flowers.

The sanctuary is private and NOT OPEN TO THE GENERAL PUBLIC. However friends, old and new, are welcome to visit - but please by appointment only!

Hummers fighting over Canna

I've been mostly posting at Facebook, but here's a recent video at the sanctuary, with 2 hummers arguing over who gets the canna flowers.