When I built the ranch some years back, I built a full length, deep, covered porch on the front of the house. It provides wonderful shade and protection from the rain and hot sun, and the house is situated so that if there’s any wind at all, it blows the full length of the porch. In the summer in Texas, wind is a good thing.
Now the whole point of having this wonderful porch is to take advantage of the outdoors and nature — so over the years I’ve added bird feeders and bird houses — and hummingbird feeders.
The first year or two I was in the ranch, I’d see a hummingbird every now and then, so I bought a feeder and some food, and put it out. And I started reading up on hummingbirds and their likes and dislikes, and their habitat and migratory patterns. They’re fascinating little creatures who spend the winters in southern Mexico and return to the U.S. each spring through Texas, heading as far north as Canada. (Sounds like some people I know.)
Well, I put out my hummingbird feeder, and the first year I’d see a hummingbird every now and then. The next summer I saw a few more but still not a lot. Then came the third summer, and it was unbelievable, there were hummingbirds everywhere! And it’s been like that ever since.
Somehow those hummingbirds passed the word, and the ranch is now a regular stop on the hummingbird trail! You see them in the mornings and late afternoon/early evening, right now I’m sitting on the porch and there must be around 30 to 40 hummers. And of course I have more than one feeder now.
If you sit quietly and watch, the hummerbirds put on a grand show, they zip up and down and circle the ranch building and chase each other and buzz me and zzzzip this way and zipppp that way and have a ball. And the babies are so little, and they come and eat and zzzzzip, to. It’s impossible to describe and wonderful to watch. And all for the price of a few feeders and some sugar water.
