Hummer Season Nearly Over: One Man's Opinion

By Ben Meisner

        
I know this isn’t going to stir the nerves of most people reading today. I just wanted to mention that within the next week, the male hummingbirds will be heading south for another year.

They arrive early, usually between April 7th and 23 rd. This year at my house on the 23rd, but then head off south around the middle of July and no they don’t take a ride on a goose or for that matter head into the mountains to get nectar from flowers and then head south.

Sorree to break your balloon it just doesn’t go that way.

But here is a tid bit for you.

Earlier this year I received a call from a Quesnel resident who knew I fancied the little fellows who told me that a local man had a permit and had banded a calliope male, which was hit by a car in Louisiana a few weeks later. It is the first actual proof that they do migrate south from this area.

I recall back when Doc Galliford and I were just on the edge of getting a permit to do some banding. We had to come under the wing of some chap in Washington who told me that because the hummers travel to so many countries we would need a special international permit which might take years. He offered us the use of his, under an umbrella program, but alas we never got beyond that point.

What makes the Rufus so interesting around these parts is the sheer number of them.

Bob Hillhouse said that he had, as he describes it, hundreds hanging around his house this year.

On the prairies and in the east they only have Ruby throated and not as many.  So Prince Goegre can boast that we are, in some fashion, the humming bird capital of the north. Not that I think they will be building statues to celebrate them.

I’m Meisner and that is one man’s opinion.

Email | Print | Facebook | Twitter | Digg | Del.icio.us