Re: [MDOsprey] Response to Hummingbird Question
PObrien776@aol.com
Sat, 18 Sep 1999 11:30:58 EDT
Leave your hummingbird feeders up until they freeze. Adult male Ruby-throats
leave at the end of the first week in September. The immature males leave
about a week later and the females stick around even longer (ours is at the
feeder today). During this time you can get migrants as well. But be
assured that your feeders will not prevent the birds from migrating. Beyond
September, you could have vagrant Selasphorus hummingbirds dropping in. Sam
Pancake has had a female Rufous come to his feeders in Tacoma Park three
different years around the first of November (he also has a profuse growth of
flowers in his garden, even at that date). Mary Ann Berberich also had a
probable female Rufous at her feeder in Bethesda from Nov. 17-21, 1996.
Numerous other sightings of Rufous-type Hummingbirds occur annually in the
Middle Atlantic states, so keep the feeders full. In fact, there was a
female Ruby-throat that spent a week at a Cecil Co. feeder in mid-December of
1994, undoubtedly a straggler. Allen's has been found as near as TN, so
watch carefully if a stranger shows up.
For the record, I keep my feeders up all year, just in case. No, they don't
crack if you only have them half full, and it takes a pretty deep freeze for
a 20% sucrose solution to solidify. Oh, I haven't gotten a Rufous - yet.
But one of these years...
Paul O'Brien
Rockville, MD
pobrien776@aol.com