Frozen Hummingbird Feeders

My friend Rich Hoyer had warned us via facebook for a couple of days: move the hummingbird feeders inside over night, or they will turn into blocks of ice. Ours are under roof overhangs,  the birds were still feeding after sunset, and later it was too cold and dark to climb up to get the feeders down ... so this morning hummers and Gila Woodpeckers looked quite unhappy and we quickly filled our spare feeders to bring outside. Now there are much more hummers feeding than I had seen for weeks.

Male Costa's Hummingbird

 In the backyard, a male Costa's guards a feeder from his perch in a Creosote Bush. He is confident enough to let me push my camera in his face. Yesterday I was only half a meter from him using the macro setting and he kept coming back to his perch and my camera after short feeding and fighting forays.

Around the corner of the house, right in front of my studio window, resides as Costa male with a gorget that resembles the beard of an old-fashioned Turkish Bey and the attitude of a territorial pit bull...He routinely threatens Randy when he hangs the laundry.

 Today several females are trying to use 'his' feeder. They are hungry and determined to stay. He attacks them in a peculiar way. He grabbs the neck feathers of a drinking female with his beak and pulls. When she ignores him, he lands on her back. I looks now more like a mating attempt then a feeder defense. Please see the video here. As the day progressed the male's approach became less aggressive and clearly more sexual. The females still ignored him if they could: they kept feeding.
Of course, I can't tell whether the females are even Costa's. I also don't know whether this feisty guy would care. I do know that ethologists see an evolutionary connection between aggression and sexual behavior...
We have been hearing the sharp whistling of the male Costa's display for a couple of weeks. I haven't found any nesting attempts yet, but the tiny nests are easy to overlook. But I guess it's too early. Rich looked up when egg laying could begin: According to the Birds of North America species account, egg laying begins in March here, but the Breeding Bird Atlas says February, with January 20 being the record early.

 With a nice flash of those structural colors (as opposed to pigments) of his gorget: Blurr and out!

Orioles and April Rain

Costa's Hummingbird

Yesterday we got some much needed rain. Not just a short April shower, but long lasting 'female' rain as native Arizonans call the gentle, productive winter drizzle. Thunderous summer monsoon showers are called male rain.

Early during our breakfast all birds bravely kept feeding.

Female Oriole

But they began to look wet and disheveled, smeared with clumpy, sticky pollen. They didn't seem to enjoy the weather very much. When it is cold - yesterday we were in the high forties - most birds, like mammals, keep their body temperature up by shivering, and that costs energy. Only a few, among them hummers and swifts, can let their core temperature drop and go into torpor like lizards, but his happens usually only at night at even lower temps.

Bullock's Oriole

After breakfast on the patio we went inside to 'do our taxes'. It's that time of the year. So the roofed patio was left to the birds. Hummers were already hiding under the eves - no great photo op there. But:

An old cholla skeleton used to support a Mandevilla that didn't make it through the February freeze. It soon looked like a traditional Easter Tree, all decorated with Orioles instead of Easter Eggs.

 

 To my surprise Hooded and Bullock's Oriole males peacefully shared the cover. Usually they are very territorial and the Hooded succeeds in chasing the Bullock's out.  

 Obviously, he didn't feel up to it in that weather and concentrated on staying warm. Or does misery really like company?

Even though I'm aware of northern species of the genus, Orioles always strike me as visitors from a lusher, tropical world with sweet fruit and perennial sunshine. Our birds seem to agree with me.

I have no idea to which species of Oriole the female belonged. She didn't show any interest in either male.

Our Cactus Wrens always populate the patio,  sharing it with us and 5 big dogs. They even go through the pages of our newspaper on the table. But this guy looks wet and miserable, too.

Update: today it's sunny, but chilly with frost on the roof, and the Orioles are happily mobbing each other with angry keck-keck-krrreck calls.