I took two photos through my window this morning about 11:15 that aren't the best but do add to the tail feather details that we have. She's not spending any time stretching or preening when perched, which indicates to me that she's at least moderately stressed. I haven't noticed her taking any insects today, but it's been pretty cold. So far she's shown little interest in the one feeder that has a protein supplement (Kaytee Exact handfeeding mix). If anyone has suggestions for other ways I could be enhancing or supplementing her diet, please let me know.
If the hummingbird is not bulked up, she probably won't leave--she seemed quite unusually hungry the day she arrived, and may have been searching for many, many miles for a meal before she found my feeder. But if she succumbs, at least we could have the carcass at the Bell's if someone will search. So if it does get cold in the coming week, when I'm out of town, and if she suddenly disappears, I guess it would be a good idea for someone to check under my trees--I think she's spent at least a couple of nights roosting in one of the spruce trees in the front yard. My mother-in-law will be here, but is 85 so I don't want her traipsing around the yard in the cold looking. Val Cunningham is going to call my mother-in-law periodically while we're gone and will send to the listserves any updates.For those who are very concerned about the little bird's well-being and think we should somehow interfere, in the vast majority of cases I've learned about when people have retrieved a hummingbird to save it and transport it to a better location, the bird died, probably mostly from the stress of capture, so the US Fish and Wildlife Service no longer issues permits for this purpose. We'll do everything in our power to keep her going as a wild (albeit somewhat subsidized) bird. The rest is up to her. <http://www.lauraerickson.com/Birds/NovemberHummingbird.html> Oh--I decided to call her Viola, after the character in The Twelfth Night who tricks people into thinking she's a boy for a while. Like Viola, she's intelligent, feisty, and independent. I hope that, as in The Twelfth Night, this story has a happy ending. Laura Erickson Duluth, MN Producer, "For the Birds" radio program <http://www.lauraerickson.com/> There is symbolic as well as actual beauty in the migration of birds. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature--the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after the winter. --Rachel Carson
