Hummingbird central tip #2

humming birds at hummingbird feeders

I promised hummingbird tips to returning readers, so I am adding another one today. Today's tip is to keep your commitment to your hummingbirds, or you will not have any hummingbird visitors! Our experience over this hurricane weekend has cemented our evaluation that Mr's constant dedication to filling the feeders the moment they are empty, made a big difference in the population of hummers at our feeders. Over the last few years I worked doggedly to build up a relationship with any hummers in the neighborhood. I will report on what I did to do that in future postings, as future tips. Today I will focus on the hyperfocus Mr put to the refilling job.

hummingbird at feeder with others waiting to board

 In the past few years feeding changed by the year. The first year hardly any hummers visited our feeders, we would have visitors every few days, but there did not seem to be any hummingbirds that were "our hummingbirds". "Our hummingbirds" being birds that appeared to live on our property or in close proximity to it. It was a real disappointment. Second year seemed to bring us one or two resident birds. I was thrilled.  Third year our numbers increased tremendously, as I said I will report why  and how in future postings. This year I had many many hummers coming around. I would say I had about 15 to 20 coming around to my two feeders. I would fill the feeders in the morning, and they would last until their evening meal at dusk. I was filling them at about 9 in the morning. Mr took over the filling, but he started filling them earlier in the morning...about 7-8am.  This early feeding brought in more hummers, so our numbers increased. The increased feeding time, and increase in visitors made the feeders run out of food before the dusk meal. Feeders were empty by 4pm. He started refilling them at that time.  This brought us even more customers. We have continued this grandiose feeding schedule, but it has brought us lots of pleasure and joy. I love to hear their communications, they sound like dolphins! I swear you can hear them laugh! So our tip for the day is don't ever have empty feeders, if you want dedicated visitors you can call "our hummingbirds".