As I tread water in my pool this afternoon, I watched with joy & delight, as several of my avian girl friends - the black chinned hummingbirds - drank from my lemon tree (which is STILL blossoming for the 4th straight month!), French Lavender, Lantana, Sawyers Hybrid Lavender, and then finished with a Honeysuckle chaser, before heading over the wall. Over a 20 minute period, I watched 3 different females follow similar routes. Get some plentiful and citrus-y lemon blossom nectar, then chase the lavenders swaying in the wind, and stop in for the honeysuckle at the end. We planted the honeysuckle back in February, and it's climbed the 6 foot fall in just 3 months.
And the back yard Ocotillo... the girls find that irresistible. hovering around the top, cranking their heads at funky angles to get to every little blossom, no matter what angle it is presented.
It's very cool, to be a big, clumsy biped, swimming in a di-hydrogen oxide and chlorine solution (at 78F pool temp), and still be able to watch these tiny avian beauties drinking voraciously from the blossoms all around the pool, enjoying the fruits of my gardening labor. Like with most males... it's all about making sure the females have enough to drink. LOL! (3 bottles of Cruzan rum went into the recycling bin this evening for pick-up tomorrow, coincidentally).
9 years ago
oh... and last Winter.. when I told my mom that I planted honeysuckle, the first thing she said was "you're going to have bees". Well, actually, we have tons of bees... on the lantana and lavender mostly. I do yoga within arm's reach of both lantana and lavender, often stretching an arm outwards over either plant when standing on one leg bent 90 degrees forward... and as long as I don't smell like flowers (or Mr.Hankey, the Christmas Pooh) they flying insects ignore me, and go about their business drinking from the flowers.
ReplyDeleteNow watch, that I posted this, I'll be stung this week ("verb, present tense 'Sting', not 'stinging', or 'stung!' I'll be watching you!" - thank you Dana Carvey!) ... but with ambient temps climbing and full sunshine warming the pool deck, it's getting a little too toasty to comfortably stand on my yoga mat without burning my feet... so I probably need to soon do yoga indoors until September arrives.
One of the black chinned females flew up to me this afternoon while I was doing stork pose next to "her lemon tree", and hovered, within arm's length, looking (I think) at my red framed sun glasses, wondering what the heck this human is doing... for like 30 seconds. Her curiosity satisfied, she flew off to what used to be Archie's clothes hanger perch in the shade of the patio, to rest for a bit before frenetically drinking from more blossoms.
ReplyDeleteClose encounters with hummingbirds are very cool.