So my friend who writes Zebra Sounds included the fact that hummingbirds have tongues in a post recently. I learned this after having watched them at our feeders (about 10 years ago). I had always thought that they used their beak as a straw, so imagine my surprise when I caught a tongue in a picture.
I was looking through my pictures for the tongue picture for her post — but we didn’t communicate well enough for her to actually use it, but in trying to find it for her, it got me looking at more of my hummingbird pictures.
Since I am not a professional photographer, I just have to sit there and take picture after picture and hope I end up with a good one. Sometimes I do.
I will try to learn more about hummingbirds and I will continue to take pictures and probably post more of some I have already taken. I have a lot. They fascincate me. And just like our other birds, since we live in San Jose and our weather is warmer for a longer season, we have birds around for six to seven months.
For now:
Their hearts beat about 21 times per second, their wings 55 – 75 times per second. They weight 1/10 of an ounce. They can feed on up to 1000 flowers a day. The hummingbird tongue licks up nectar at the rate of 13 licks per second. And they do eat insects.
Somewhat unrelated, to these pictures, I just wanted to mention, yesterday I was outside taking pictures and working out and one flew right up to me, within arm’s reach and just hovered where I was kneeling. I think they are a very curious bird. Maybe they are almost as curious about us as we are about them?
I want to remind my awesome readers that my pictures are all mine. I take them all myself and it is not cool at all to steal them.
Terre Pruitt's Blog 