Brooksville area has hummers in the winter as well. That is one of the towns that Fred Bassett stops in to band when he is headed to Lakeland. That is usually in Jan. or Feb. I have had a female that has been around now for a couple of weeks. Throughout the winter, I have had numerous birds - they seem to hang for a week or so then would leave, often just after another would arrive. I had at least 3 immature Rufous and my adult female visited but didn't stay. I use Journey North to post my hummers. I like that you can use the map and the sighting page where you can give description of what you saw. If you go to www.learner.org it will get you there. Check it out, there is a picture of one of my birds on the discussion page.(an immature male Ruby that Fred banded in Jan.) I have posted my winter sightings there but will wait till a different bird shows up to post for "First Sighting". Joe, here in Lakeland had 6 adult males, a female, an immature male , all Ruby-throated and an immature Black-chinned. stay the winter with him. Last time I spoke with him, he still had 4 males and the female. he thought he had a migrating male show up that day. Tom, do you use Steve Backes floridahummingbird site? It is quite good for a forum to chat back and forth with others and it keeps us posted about when people start seeing birds in migration locally. The Great Backyard Bird Count was a couple weekends ago. Lakeland had the most hummers reported in the state, although, we know that the Pandhandle was having a record number of them being banded earlier this winter.

I think the surveyor's tape works...I gave some to my husband's niece too. It seemed to work for her also. She had tried only a few times to feed them in years past. His nephew (lives about 3 blocks away) has been feeding hummers for many years. They all live in the UP of Michigan & there's tons of RTHs there. There's nothing more fun than getting dive bombed by a hummer & watching (or trying to watch) the the activity at all their feeders. I had always thought the southern tier states had all the hummers until we went north. WOW!

HenBoy, Yes he will know when to leave. It is the shortening of the daylight hours that triggers the migration. Generally those that stay behind are the ones that are too old or possibly ill that instinctively know that they can't make the journey. Penny

That's beautiful, Robert. I love the way you've crossed and trimmed the vine. I've never seen that before. Very elegant. They look terrific against your grey fence, really perfect there. Mine are 4 years old this spring, They are extremely vigorous, growing fast and strong and blooming all summer, getting much bigger than the catalogues said they would. They are stunning in May, just a wall of red, and bloom mostly all summer from May to frost. After seeing hummers darting in and out of them late last summer I wouldn't give them up for anything else. Even the thicket behind the blooms has to be a wonderful place for bird's nests or sheltering.