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ATWT Discussion Group
We had a very interesting day yesterday. We went to a state park where they were banding hummingbirds. We got to see how they were caught, banded, and released. A man would catch a hummer and put it into a bag that a child was holding and they would take it to a nearby table where another man would band it. Everyone would get a number and when their number was called the man who banded the hummer would lay the bird in their hand to release it. Sometimes the bird would lay in their hand several minutes before flying away. You could feel the hummers heart beating. In future banding's, if your hummer is caught again, you will be notified of where your hummer migrated to. I thought that nearly all hummers go back to the area's where they were born, but that is not always the case. However, I know I had the same male hummer for three summers. If the sugar water ran out he would look in my kitchen window to let me know, and he would do the same to let me know he was here in the spring. We haven't seen him the last two summers. However, if I don't have my feeders out when the hummers get here in the spring, I find them buzzing around the trellis that is near where I hang the feeders. They act like they are in familiar territory.
I would highly recommend you bird lovers to attend a hummer banding. It was great to see the looks on the children's faces when they watched the whole process, and to watch the adults act like children when they held their hummer and released it. Getting out with nature is good for the soul.
That must have been a wonderful experience especially for the children.
We have a lot of hummingbirds in Arizona and they love all our shrubs with flowers. We sit and watch them a lot.
I know what you mean about birds remembering if you feed them. We used to feed raw hamburger to the road runners. We would freeze little balls of the meat then when the road runner came around and squauked (they have a horrible call), we would go and defrost the meat in the microwave. They knew the sound of the microwave meant food was coming. One time I left the screen door open and the road runner came right into the kitchen. I wasn't too happy about that as they are not the cleanest birds.
Anyway, we stopped feeding the road runners several years ago because they would catch and eat the baby quail that were born and raised in our yard. So I decided I'd discourage them from coming around. But there are still road runners that come up and squauk for the hamburger even though it's been about four years since we stopped feeding them.
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