Kristin,
You are right. The warmer weather is a signal of the of the "hummingbird" season. I can't wait. I plan to put out several feeders this, and maybe I will have as many hummers as my mom.

Last year was the first year I decided to start feeding the hummingbirds. I had seen occasional hummers over the years, sipping from my Nicotianas and lilies, but they never seemed to stick around--or maybe I just wasn't watching.

Everything changed last summer when my orange trumpet vine began to bloom for the first time. The vine frames the front dining room window, and we were thrilled to notice the little birds dipping into the flowers. Inspired, I found a small glass bottle, and improvised a feeder from it by sticking in a rubber stopper and a red flower I made with Sculpey clay. It works great and is easy to clean. I saw as many as 4 birds at a time at my poor man's feeder during the months of August and into September. I'm saying 4 birds, but can't be certain that there weren't more.

Now I'm eagerly anticipating the warm temperatures that presage their return, but don't know if "my" birds will return. This year, there will be Columbine and Monarda waiting for them, my newest additions to the garden. I'm hoping this will provide them with some food before the late summer blooming trumpet vine. I'm planning on putting my feeder up on April 1, although I doubt that any will show up before mid April. Will they think to check out our trumpet vined window in the early spring, and find the Columbine instead? I hope so!

Kristin,
If you plant it...they will come! Your babies have long memories and you should see them soon! I'm awainting them anxiously down here in Maryland too! They seem to be the highlight of my year, every year! You can't go wrong with Salvia Splendens, Lady in Red in your garden either!!!

Happy Humming,
glo

Kristin,
They do indeed return to areas that provided what they needed the previous year. I am sure they will have no problem finding your columbine if it in bloom. I grew my native columbine from seed last year so it will bloom for the first time this year. It is planted right below where I hang one of my first feeders of the season. I also make sure that I have a basket or two of impatiens and gartenmeister bonstadt fuschia for them when they return until the rest of the garden plants kick into high gear. This year I will be adding over 20 new salvias and hopefully more agastaches.

Penny

Kristin,
I want to thank you for the link to the hummingbird map. I, too, began feeding hummingbirds last year and enjoyed watching so much that I put my feeders out March 1st this year. I live down here in Alabama and with your map link found out I was not crazy in doing so. I will let you know if I see any soon.

Thanks everyone for your kind suggestions and comments! I have a shortage of sun, so don't know if Lady in Red Salvia would do well for me. I'll read up on it, and decide. There is one spot I could put it, if it is sun-loving. The impatiens should certainly do fine in low light, so I should probably try them. Amazingly, I've never grown them before, and they're such a common garden plant.

As it stands now, Bleeding Heart and Columbine will be my earliest flowers, followed by early summer Monarda "Gardenview Scarlet," followed perhaps by a gap in the blooming, and finally the trumpet vine in the late summer. The trumpet vine is the plant that started my whole hummer fascination--and boy do they love it! To extend the season earlier, I've been toying with trying the native Azalea, Rhododendron periclymenoides--I think it's the one called Pinxtner's (sp?). It is deciduous and very early blooming, so would sort of round out my continuous blooming scheme by providing some very early blooms--earlier even than the Columbine, or Bleeding Heart. I know it does well in partial shade, but our soil is somewhat alkaline, and I don't know how well it would tolerate this. I suppose I could add tons of soil acidifiers, but kind of hate to buck nature so much. I'd like to try the Fuchsia--Gartenmeister Bonstadt. I think Fuchsias are lovely, and I know that you, Penny, and others have had good luck with them. Again, I'm going to have to read up on their sunlight requirements. It's not that I have no sun, it's just more of a 3 or 4 hour situation, and a rather cloudy climate here in Western PA. I have to choose my plants carefully. Another shade tolerant plant would be Lobelia cardinalis. I'll probably try to work those in, but haven't yet bought any plants or seeds.

Thanks for confirming my feelings about the memory of hummers. I hope you guys are right and that those little hummers will remember my garden and return to have a look see. What has me wondering and worrying is that their memories might be so good that they might not come back until August, which is when the Trumpet vines started blooming and I began providing sugar water. Hopefully, this won't be the case. Instead, after surviving their arduous journeys, I am hoping that they will return to have a look in the spring, even though in previous years there wasn't much for them. This year, however, it will be different. I've gotta keep the faith, but I'm nervous. I've always had more of a summer to fall blooming garden and just don't know if the hummingbirds are going to scope out my new spring and early summer additions.

I'll let you know!

Kristin,
The fuschias do well in shade. I hung my first ones on the branches under a red maple tree. Last year I had one in a very shadey corner that got little sun at all. this year I will put a couple of the rooted cuttings in front of my porch that is in mostly heavy shade all summer because of two more huge maples that shade the entire front yard. If you have the place for it a coral honeysuckle vine will bloom all summer long and the hummers just love it. It blooms best in sun but even half day of sun will work. I grow a lot of my sunlovers in containers so that I more flexibility where sunlight is concerned. The back part of my driveway seems to get the best sun all day when the sun is actually shining so I do grow a lot of plants in containers and deep window boxes so that they flank the drive. I have even grown cannas in containers. Hostas will also attract hummers and require very little care once established.

As for Azaleas and Rhododendrons. Yes they prefer acidic soil but I ad lots of peat moss and even coffee grounds and some compost. During early spring I feed them with an acid fertilizer and they do fine. I grew them in Louisiana in solid clay without any amendments. Cardinal flower is a later bloomer does best in part shade and moist soil. I found that the great blue lobelia seems to be a bit hardier for me than the lobelia cardinalis.

I will be planting some of my salvia this year in a bed that gets morning sun and shade from about noon on but I think they will do well. Coral Bells is another that does well in shade and partially moist soil. Mine blooms early but I think there are some that bloom a little later. Nasturtiums will do well in partial shade and morning glories may actually bloom longer in partial shade (morning sun and afternoon shade).

Penny

Well, everyone--so much for my 60 degree theory on hummingbird migration. I've noticed on the hummer map website that those little guys (and gals) are advancing into northern Tennessee, and my weather map says that these states are still firmly in winter's grasp, with temps not climbing out of the 40's. So much for my theory!

How on earth are these teeny, high energy birds doing this, and what do the early birds feed on? What could possibly be blooming in northern Tennessee? Daffodils? Around here, in southwestern PA, there are only my species crocuses, and they aren't even a native species. Maybe there are some spring ephemerals blooming in the forests of Tennessee, but it still seems a bit early to this northerner. I'll have to take a walk in our local woods and see if I can find anything shooting up--Spring Beauties? Toothwort? It seems much too early for Dutchman's Britches and Trout Lilies. I'm not sure if any of these are nectar sources, anyway.

Could these early hummers be getting by exclusively on sugar water feeders? Or, I remember reading once that hummers could feed on tree sap, often made available by sapsuckers. That would certainly be available now, but it's not nearly as sweet as flower nectar--I know this because I've tasted both! I'm amazed that they're advancing so far north with all of this cold weather in the northeast.

Bear with me, folks, and I hope I'm not boring you with my rambling questions. Maybe I'm just killing time on the keyboard while I wait for my first hummers. I sure hope that they find my yard and we can get reacquainted.

In Tenn. the Red bud trees are beginning to bud out and bloom along with some hardy perennials and bulbs. Dwarf Red Buckeye is a very early blooming tree that they will use and is hardy to zone 4 or 5. Some of the native azaleas are also starting to bloom along with forsythia. Yes they also are able to glean tree sap for energy and the tiny bugs that they attract. There are also quite a few of us that keep at least one feeder out year round for overwintering western migrants and for very early ruby-throats. Hummers can handle temps down into the 20's and are hardier than we give them credit. If temps get very cold they go into a type of suspended animation called torpor to conserve body heat and energy.

Recently one of the neighboring towns started trimming maple trees that lined some of the streets. Well the sap must be running b/c everywhere they removed a limb the sap started pouring out of the tree wound and froze. The tree sap looks like large icicles hanging from where the limbs were cut off. All I could think of when I saw this was that they hummers would surely love this if they were here.

Penny

Thanks, Penny. I guess it's just hard to imagine from my wintry location that there could actually be blooming flowers in a place as far north as Tennessee. If, as you say, the redbuds and buckeyes are blooming there, plus tree sap, and insects, and the occasional nectar feeder, I can see how they are subsisting. Looking at their northward advance from cold, still barren western PA, it just seems amazing.

My concern wasn't so much that they couldn't stand the temperatures, (I know they can) just that it didn't seem to me that much would be in bloom before average high temperatures started to get into the 50's or 60's. On the other hand, when I think about it, Tennessee must be at least 2 and probably closer to 4 weeks ahead of us in their weather. When I think of where we will be by early to mid April, I realize that there will be quite a few more things in bloom like early azaleas, and some of the early flowering trees like plum, and the buckeye you spoke of that I have never actually seen around here.

I knew about the ability of hummers (and caprimulgids like whippoorwills and nighthawks) to go into a torpor to wait out bad conditions, but it still amazes me that something as small as a hummingbird could be so tough and manage to find enough to eat in a landscape that still seems pretty cold and barren. I do realize that even tropical birds can stand surprisingly cold weather, as long as they have enough to eat. I guess the hummers are somehow managing to find it.

One of my favorite signs of spring is the first song of the whippoorwill. I could listen to it all night, and usually do. LOL. (Besides the hummers of course.)

Kristen
If you think about it the Rufous hummer is several weeks ahead in migration of our rubythroats and they are heading up to Alaska. I doubt there is a lot up that way in bloom either but they do manage.

Penny

Kristin - on the other side of the state here in the Philly area, the redbuds and some early cherries have been blooming the past couple weeks and the Bradford pears are just starting now - thanks to the little heatwave we had at the beginning of the month. Even my own little plum tree is trying to bloom (although I know it is an early one normally) and my blueberries will probably be blooming in a week or two. The forsythia has been blooming for awhile along with the pieris and having just peeped outside, it looks like the silver maple trees are now blooming (that maple's tiny flowers are red and I wonder if hummers would peck at a maple tree flower????).

Jenny - I think we're a bit behind you, but our forsythias are in bloom, and also the silver maples. I'm not sure about the redbuds, or blueberries (the soil is much too alkaline around here!), and I don't think I've seen any showy flowering trees like the Bradford Pears or Plums. I'm sure they'll be coming soon if this persistent cold weather would loosen its grip.

Had to walk to the bank this morning from where I work downtown and I saw more Bradfords busting out. Also saw some weeping cherries getting started too.

Don't worry Kristin... The warmer air is coming and you'll probabably get it first!!

Has anyone in Kentucky had any hummer sitings yet? I looked at the map and saw where they have recently been sited on the border so stuck my feeder out today!

Saw our first Rufus yesterday!

Surrey, British Columbia, Canada

I am in South Eastern Pa and was wondering what in the world a hummer would eat here now too. Do they get nectar from Bradford pears and weeping cherries? Our rhododendrons are not yet in bloom. The daffodils are blooming and the trees are blooming but I didn't know they would take nectar from them. They must be getting food from something though because on the migration map they have been spotted in Southeastern Pa!