Hummingbirds

As the craziness of the last few months settled down I came across an old hummingbird feeder.  Gene found the concentrate to fill the bottle.  This first attempt was on older bottle that cracked spilling all the fake nectar on the patio.  After locating the newer feeder, we set up a single feeding center for one of our favorite aviary friends and awaited the hummers.  And they came one and two at a time.

At least one ruby throated hummingbird is a bit of a bully.  There seems to be one in every crowd these days.  These ruby males delight in chasing any and all other hummers away from the nectar prize.  Yesterday two of the rubys were chasing each other.  A smaller hummer, possibly female ruby,  frequents the feeder when the bully is elsewhere.  We have delighted in watching the hummer's little tongues extracting the sweet, red juice from the feeder.  Well, at least we have enjoyed till the male ruby bully returns.

It is craft fair season in the Ozarks.  Along with craft fairs, fall has brought a change in the weather pattern and temperatures.  It has begun to rain every few days.  This was one of the every few days.  Not buckets of rain, just a slow gentle rain that can soak you through to the bone if you are without a coat or umbrella.

Today's excitement was to join two friends for a trek to the crafts fair in Branson.  We planned to meet at 8:30 AM in a parking lot across town.  I was up early eating a bowl of oatie oats, drinking coffee and watching the hummingbird feeder.  To my surprise and pleasure 2 tiny hummers came to rest on the feeder.

This extra crisp morning there was no bully in sight, just the two drenched, shivering hummers resting on the feeder.  They appeared to be hunkered down to get warmer.  They sat there through about half of my breakfast.  I rose to retrieved my cell phone to take a picture and one hummer flew away.  I returned from the other end of the house with the camera phone.  That is when the last of the two hummers took flight.

We three ladies made it to Branson.  The ads had said there were over 100 vendors for the craft fair.  Well, that was not the reality.  One large tent was full of vendors, probably 20 vendors.  An additional 10 or so individual tents and about the same number of food vendors were all we found.

I had a rain jacket with a hoodie and an umbrella.  Kathy had a broken umbrella.  Devon had a jacket, no hoodie.  We took ourselves back to the car after a trip around the tents and a couple of shops.  No, thanks, to all offers of food in the rain.  We motored over the Grand Village shops.  It was dry inside the stores but plenty wet between them.  A nice lunch and a couple more shops and it was time to head to the car.

Kathy had given up on the umbrella and was pretty soaked from head to toe.  Devon's jacket was soaked as was mine.  Anything not covered by a jacket was wet.  We were all hunkered down as we made our way to the car.  We got into Devon's red car and took flight just like the little hummingbirds.