here the deal i have been living in the spot i am at now for over 10 years. we are fixing to move to an area in the country that doesnt have people who try to attract them. i am desperalty going to miss my hummingbirds and desperstly want some at the new place.
what can i do besides painting my house red to attract them. unfortunatly i cant take my fimosa tree which they love with me. too big.
any help welcomed. Marie sad in sc
how to attract hummers???
imzadi,
Get yourself a couple of feeders if you have the time to take care of them. You can also plant some flowers hummingbirds love. If you don't have a lot of garden space just put them in pots. Build it and they will come. Good luck in your new place and happy humming.
Try at least 5 feeders. You will be rewarded with many hummers. Be sure to space them out. If you are currently not in the country, once you are, you should have more hummers than you did before.
I planted alot more hummingbird attracting flowers and still have some annuals to put in too, only one feed but plan on getting 2 more. Good Greif all this stuff to get addicted too.
Don't worry put out several feeders and plant lots of red flowers: THEY WILL COME!
Good luck
I agree, just put out lots of feeders. We put out about 15 it seems like the more feeders you have the more hummers stay around. There were times last summer when there were so many buzzing around you couldn't count them!
They love petunias, so I always make sure I have a big bed of them. They also like my butterfly bushes... but, then again, they like most all of the flowers it seems....
Hang a couple out well before they're supposed to arrive in your area... here they are supposed to arrive around April 15, a couple of years ago we had one at the feeder that hangs on the kitchen window before that... and the feeder wasn't full. Didn't take me long to get one filled for him. :-)
When you fill your feeders add a drop of Orange extract to your mixture. It works for me.
Has anyone seen a hummingbird's nest? I have seen their eggs and a nest only in a museum.
We had a nest about 10 feet off of the ground a tree last summer. Here's a picture of mama on the nest. Nat
Thanks, Nat that is so cute! The eggs are the size of a green pea.
Salvias always draw them in for me, but I've also seen them at the lantana, mallows, clerodendron, and all sorts of stuff.
In the spring I watch for the males to do the mating dance. They swing back and forth like a huge pendelum. I read this in a book and I started watching early in the season. I thought I might share this so you could watch also.
I finally saw my first one last summer, I've been trying for three years to get them to notice my yard!
I have one neighbor with in 1/2 mile and I think we are competion on who has the most at their feeders. She invites me over and always seems to have more! I have a lot more flowers but she has many feeders. I usually have two.
When I first added the orange extract to my hummingbird nectar, I had 9 hummingbirds at 1 feeder. My neighbors wanted my recipe. I didn't give it to them. I got the idea out of a Rodale advertisement.
hugeposiepatch,
Where do you buy orange extract? I read somewhere not to put any thing in the nectar , and I've also read to just make your nectar 4 parts water to 1 part sugar. I have a neighbor that makes here nectar like 1 to 1 and she has a bunch. I make mine at the recomended 4 to 1. If it dosn't hurt them I might try it this year. Want do ya think?
My mom was buying the prepackaged nectar--I told her to make her own, only she confused the 4-1 as 1-4. They drank it. LOL
I'm sure they had a sugar high, but it didn't seem to affect her population.
I've heard the same thing, that anything other than sugar and water could cause some kind of bacteria for them. I have no idea.
I wish they would just design the feeder to be cleaned easier.
Our area only sells the small opening feeder. Do they make a large mouth? I would buy it.
I buy my orange extract at Wal-mart--in the spice isle. I also add a couple of drops of red food coloring. We use 1 cup of sugar to 4 cups of water, I add 1-2 drops of orange extract and 2 drops of red food coloring. We change the nectar every week and wash the feeder out with hot water w/ arm and hammer baking soda in it. The fungus doesn't come from the extract or the food coloring--it is a natural fungus in the sugar.
I was surprised to see hummingbirds going for my coral bells. They also seem to prefer the yellow butterfly bush over the purple one.
Yay! I set hummer feeder two last two weeks.. waited and now we have 4 hummers!!! All are males.. I bought other two feeders. Now I have 4 of them.. Even I bought several red/pink/fuschias flowers. Now I think my nieghbor stole my hummers!!! They had only one feeder..
i was always told their attracted to red, so what if the feeder is clear? will they go to the red looking feeder rather than to the clear one.? I could paint the feeder red. I only have 2 feeders out, time to go buy some more.
kathy