Your hummers are probably Anna's which are here year round. We have five of them at our house between Renton and Issaquah. You can change the formula to 3 to 1 when it is going to be below 32 degrees for an extended time. It will not freeze as easily. We are able to have someone here most of the time. When it is that cold, we bring the feeders in after dark and put them out just before dawn. We have multiple feeders because of the additional Rufous that are here in the summer. We keep one inside at room temp and swap it if a feeder freezes. It may seem like a lot of work but it has to get into the high twenties before ours freezes which doesn't happen that often. The birds are a lot more resilient then we think and have made it through the winter for a long time. They eat a lot of spiders which are still available in the interior of trees and shrubs. They will get through this cold spell even if you can't keep your feeder from freezing. Just remember to keep fresh syrup in your feeders after this cold spell and they will stay until the Rufous come back in the spring and try to chase them away. BnB A male Anna's is siting in this bush inside the white box between trips to the feeder. Unfortunately, the sun is too low in the sky to shine into the hole for better pictures.

Greetings! As an avid Birder, I'm amazed that Hummingbirds are being reported from NY State before May. Have any of you actually SEEN one yet?? We are talking record early here... In Syracuse, most of the RUHU (Hummingbirds) arrive around May 1st. In my yard, the average is around May 9th. It doesn't hurt to get your feeders out early, just make sure to change the fluid each week. Orioles are due this week, and they too come to feeders. Mine are also attracted to juice oranges cut in half and impaled on tree branches, etc. Both Orioles and Hummingbirds benefit from a sweeter nectar in early spring. Exhausted from migration, they load up on calories as soon as they arrive. I usually make a 3:1 solution for the first two weeks. Follow Penny's advice above, just use 3 cups of water to 1 cup PURE CANE SUGAR. Note the bag must say PURE CANE SUGAR. The Wegmans brand of cheap sugar is made from beets, and RUHU ignore it. After mid-May, RUHU nectar goes back to 4:1. Good Luck!! I'll post when my Hummers return!!! PS: You can make a hanging basket for them by using cheap annuals potted in last year's Fuschia basket. Use Salvia, Impatiens, Phlox, etc. Most superstores have something in the L&G section by now!!

hahaha! I had the camera sitting right here...both of 'em! Hubby left the one good one, the one that can zoom real good for me. But that little bugger was gone the instant I realized he was there. No time for pictures. Soon though.. I'll get a picture soon. Stuffed hummingbird...sure...Next Christmas I'm going to find me some hummer tree ornaments and just hang them all over my yard! I'll never be with out my hummers then!

really there is no need to go through any photo editing if all you need to do is get a smaller size, you will have to upload the picture to a site like photobucket to be able to use it here, it takes one simple click to select a smaller size directly at the time of upload right on the photobucket site, and you are done (there are 2 ways). Then grab your html forum code and paste it to your reply box. When you go to your photobucket account, you will see the big upload button, on top of that is the more upload tools option click on there and you can select where to upload from like your pc or a website and also you can select a size, basically small med and large very simple. Select it there then hit upload. Another easier way to do the same thing is right on the upload area you will see it says Tip: hold down CTRL to select multiple files and then in () it says more options if you click on that more options you can select your desired size right there, select size, then upload file, remember to then hit the save button so it saves it to your photobucket album. Then just copy your forum html link it provides you into your thread post here and you are done, and you keep your original as it was on the pc and have the smaller version on photobucket. If you prefer to simply use a thumbnail view you can set your link options in photobucket to give you the html code for both the regular size and the thumbnail size, after you upload a picture and save it to your album you will see the image and the available codes for it, below that you will see link options click on that and you can select there all of the various types of links that you want to be provided, for these forums you must use the html code so select both of the html options and you will then be able to select the thumbnail view html code to post to your GW thread and using it you do not have to worry about resizing at all, they simply click on the thumbnail to view the fulls size picture.