Hi Ann! I second marlingardener's suggestion. The local man at TX Parks & Wildlife in my area has been sooooo helpful, I wonder if he had nothing to do all day before I came along with all my questions! He came out to my property and spent the entire day walking around with me, making suggestions and identifying plants and showing me how to identify scat and tracks. Gave me his email address and has continued to answer all questions, tell me where to look for info, etc. for years. I would be glad to exchange info on this board if that works for everybody. Wildlife is a part of farm life around our place.

Jenny, Yes...those are single flower garden stake hummie feeder balls. I'd made a deal with WalMart to buy their left over supply a couple of winters ago. Had the idea of the hummie-port in my mind and was waiting for the opportunity to buy lots of those cheap! I don't use that 'hummie-port' during the summer as there are only about a dozen regular hummies here now. Also I just can't keep the ants from crawling up the wood post. In addition, the feeder holes on those plastic flowers are the perfect size for a bee to get it's big butt stuck in - so I had lots of dead bees clogging them up! I had put it out in the yard a couple of weeks ago to try to get some photos - had filled only six flowers but it rained and the water got into the upright holes. I didn't feel like lugging it to the backporch so I just turned the flowers downward to let them completely drain. I saw a hummie a few days ago trying to get up under the flower to check it out :o) Cute...but I wasn't fast enough with the camera. Maybe I'll set it up again and try to photos during the fall migration. ~ Cat

Suz2020 Heres some more info for you. Your base does not need to be pitched. Its always the ring which if treated too roughly can break. I have had mine for years. Also when you get that black stuff inside the base and around the portholes that is mold and needs a good bleach soak of about 1-10 ratio for about 1/2hr to an hour or so and then rinsed well with cold water. I found this site which has the pp209 ring perch for $2.35 but they do charge $5.99 ups ground shipping. That is all you really need. Scroll down the page to the left hand corner you will see the correct replacement ring. An entire new feeder cost from $16 on up. They also show the entire base for $6.35. Anyway thats about as good as you can do. Here is a link that might be useful: hummingbird parts

Our Cardinals bring us such pleasure. We've noticed the male always appears first, maybe to ck if it's safe enough for her to come. Pairs seem very devoted to each other -the male offers his female tidbits of ??? when she first joins him, looks kinda' like they're kissing. I read they are groundfeeders, and ours must be or like what they find on our lawn a whole lot. It's not unusual to see 4-6 males at a time near flowerbed around two large trees close to the front porch...but if a female drops in her 'mate' chases the other males away. They prefer birdbath in back over ones in front and side yard-perhaps because trees are closer to it. Year before last we had the pleasure of watching a pair build a nest in a very large wreath on one wall of our covered patio. It had bright colored thread woven in & bits of dryer lint tucked in to line it, our contribution decorate the nursery. When two eggs appeared we could hardly wait for the babes to appear! Then very early one morning our Doxie simply would not stop barking or come away from the top step to the entrance near the nest. I went out to see what he was having such a fit over and a snake was coiled up, hiding behind behind a potted plant in the corner! A neighbor came and killed it for me (I was too chicken.) The #&!@$ thing had swallowed both eggs, giving me four MORE reasons to hate snakes -two for the poor parents who were so confused and upset and two for the babies to be. Attempting to save the eggs the man who killed it chopped egg sections out, but they were already broken. They've raided our bluebirds houses too and as far as we're concerned, the only good snake is a dead one.