Humming Bird Delight

We returned to El Vado State Park.  To our delight there were an abundance of humming birds anxiously waiting for our feeders.
We joked that they probably see our bright red pickup as a signal that the bird feeders are back.

There are four feeding stations on each feeder.  Usually one male bird will claim the feeder and run off the other humming birds as they come in to feed.  As you can see in this photo, they are sharing the feeder.  When we were at Heron State Park last year, a Rufus male claimed the feeder and successfully kept most of the other hummers from feeding.  We were told by one of the rangers that the farther they  migrate, the more aggressive they are.

Here I was able to capture the humming birds in flight as they came to the feeder.

This still shot allows you to see the back side of this humming bird.  The color is an iridescent olive green.  I believe they are broad tails.

We hung up a second feeder and soon had visitors feeding at each feeder.  At one time, we counted as many as twelve birds coming to the feeding stations.  This was during the first two weeks of August, and there were not too many flowers in bloom.

Here I captured a photo of the humming birds in flight.  I tried to capture a movie of them, but could not figure out the movie picture function of my camera quickly enough.  I will have to go back to school on that, and then relearn how to upload movies to my blog.

If you look closely, the bird on the right, that is closest, has a white band around his throat.  I believe it is a male.  When they hover in flight facing you, you can see alternating white and brown feathers in their fanned out tails.  This led me to believe they are broad tail humming birds.

I checked out images of broad tail humming birds on google, and many of them looked like the pictures I have.  However, there quite a few images of broad tail humming birds with a bright red throat.  I am not an expert on bird identification, but do enjoy watching them.  Humming birds are one of my favorite species.

El Vado lake is being drained down so repair work can be done on the dam.  The ramp was closed, but I was allowed to put my kayak on the lake.  It was nice not have to share the lake with motor boats, ski jets, and water skiers. 

The main draw back to El Vado and Heron State Parks is the lack of cell phone and Internet signal.  The cool mountain air will probably draw us back next year.

We left El Vado for Caballo Lake State Park so my next blog post will feature it.