Essay by Lou Bendrick
Wildlife – October 2000 – Colorado Central Magazine
AH, SUMMER. In the Rockies it’s a season marked by many things, such as rodeo, camping, bing cherries, forest fires and wildflowers. But perhaps more than any other sound (even that of the backhoe), the shrill whir of the hummingbird marks summer in the West.
Normally, hummingbirds are merely the Yorkshire terriers of the avian world: cloyingly cute, small and nervous. This summer, I had a problem with hummingbirds: they turned into little bloodsuckers. Not really. But sometimes when we try to do something nice for nature, it backfires.
It’s not that I don’t like birds — some of my best friends are birds. It’s just that I am not an avid birder. This is only a problem because I married into an avid birder family, the kind of people who, with binoculars dangling, checkmark their Audubon Field Guides and pride themselves in knowing the call of the blue-footed boobie. (No, really, such a bird exists.)
Much to the chagrin of my husband, bird conversations in my house tend to go like this:
Me: “Look! Those bronze-chested birds of spring are back.”
Husband: “Those are robins.”
Me: “You sure those aren’t crows?”
Husband: (astonished) “Crows are black!”
Me: “Even their noses?”
Husband: “Those are beaks.”
Me: “I thought you said those were robins.”
As I was saying, this year we had a problem with our swarm of hummingbirds. (Okay! Don’t wave that book at me, I know it’s called a flock.) My husband, who adores all things winged, especially adores hummingbirds. This year he hung two feeders on our deck, and by early summer we had a nice crop going. Then he went away for the weekend, leaving me to care for the colony.
It was surprisingly easy. Mix sugar and hot water and presto: nectar. The birds were so accustomed to our feeder that we didn’t even need messy red food coloring.
Anyone who has asserted that sugar is bad for you has never met a hummingbird. The wee birds suckled contentedly, oblivious to dental decay. (Of course, they don’t have teeth, so why should they worry?) I patted myself on the back and went to work.
A few hours later the feeders were empty. The hummers had a diabetic thirst I attributed to the hot weather. I cheerily refilled the feeders. The ravenous, feathered Lilliputians drained two feeders in three hours. Not only were they growing in numbers and telling their friends, they were swarming the feeder and fighting over the little watering holes. They made a racket, too. Their charming buzz started to sound like mini police whistles.
“They won’t bother you if you don’t bother them,” I told the nervous dog.
Our deck looked like a scene from a Hitchcock movie. The flower-snubbing midgets fed until moonrise. At dawn’s first light, they arrived again like a small fleet of winged dentist drills. By the time my avid birder husband returned, I was exhausted from feeder duty and wearing ear plugs. And I was afraid.
“The hummers. They want human blood,” I murmured.
INDEED, THEY NO LONGER SCATTERED when I removed the feeders, but hovered, aggressively buzzing my head, staring accusingly with beady little black eyes.
“Here’s what we do,” I said, seizing his arm. “We electrify the feeders. Kinda like those bug zappers. We’ll have a good harvest. Their flesh will be sweet, but more or less like chicken.”
The hubby glared. “How much sugar are you giving them?”
I fessed up. A lot of sugar. I’d gone to the grocery store and bought the jumbo sugar sack, sized for taffy makers.
The upshot: The birds were jacked on sugar and it was all my fault. I had corrupted nature, created winged junkies. Instead of snoozing at night they were almost certainly hanging out on street corners, roughing up Yorkshire terriers. And I was their kingpin. I felt terrible. Even more so because I had drafted a recipe for Hummingbird nuggets with barbecue dipping sauce. (Their little noses would be so handy for dipping!)
After a brief, painful withdrawal period, the birds have gone back to normal, traveling merely at the speed of light now. I, however, am not trustworthy around wildlife — the kind of person who tries to share a jam sandwich with “that big bear” that has been lingering around the campsite. And, even if I someday recognize the call of the blue-footed boobie, I will never be allowed into the ranks of avid birders.
Lou Bendrick is a contributor to writers on the Range, a service of High Country News (www.hcn.org). She knows a magpie when she sees one and lives in Telluride, Colo.
