August 3rd 2011 Anna's Hummingbird

Today I saw all my regular guests but one of my regular guests gave me a pleasant surprise.  It was an Anna's Hummingbird.  I do have a hummingbird feeder out on my patio and it needed cleaned and refilling so I took it down.  It is very important that you keep the feeder clean and change the sugar water every few days before it goes bad.  In the winter you can keep it out longer.  Always chill the sugar water before putting it out. You can kill or make hummingbirds very sick if you don't.  Also you can make them very sick and they can die if you use anything else other than plain white sugar.  Brown sugar or organic sugars are bad because it contains some molasses which is high in iron that their little bodies can't tolerate it.  You don't need to color your sugar water red or anything else it's not good for them and it does nothing for attracting them anyway.  Once I finished with all that and their sugar water cooled I carried it outside.  As I was walking the feeder over to put it up a hummingbird came right over and kind of scared me by coming inches from my face I guess to check me out than it fed while I still had the feeder hanging in my hand.  It was a very cool personal experience. I suppose they aren't so afraid of us because they move lightning fast and we must look slow motion to them.  Here is a link about Hummingbird Care if anyone is interested http://www.hummingbirds.net/feeders.html and also a picture of the Anna's Hummingbird which I told you about.