Suet and snow

Now it is thawing, but when I began this draft Janet and I were sitting in a powerless house with a ten inch burden of snow on branches and lawns and cars and walkways, and a chilly chilly nighttime forecast. I shifted to more urgent human-based chores of clearing walkways, shaking branches, checking pipes but my camera joined me outside. When not shoveling and scraping, my cold-clumsy hands fired dozens of camera shots in hopes of a few adequate ones. It is mostly a blessing to be knocked aside the head with the reminder of what is important and what is merely accustomed. We planned on stovetop cooking, heavy blankets, warm hats, candles, and hot water bottles. We thought we might reread some neglected book by flashlight and candle, but mostly we read power outage reports on a modern smart phone that miraculously kept enough of its charge.

A twelve hour power outage is an inconvenience, a conversation starter, not a lot more. Add two feet of snow and our urban 21st century lives slow to a stall. If the snow was to stick around, like it does for our Wyoming friends, we could adapt or move. But soak this remarkable three day accumulation with rain, and even the most cheerful fan of a snowy winter teeters on exasperation.

With snow, wildlife also assumes a new cadence. Visible at our front window is a suet cage. When snow is heavy so too is feeder traffic, up to a point. Any suet feeder draws in an extraordinary diversity of birds. As the white grows from 6 inches to 9 inches to 12 inches the steady stream of visitors also grows. Grey clouds of tiny kinetic bushtits tumble in; broadly varied juncos jostle about, ever-present and charming if rather thuggish; black-capped chickadees - the neighborhood guardians and messengers - arrive and depart on their own schedule.

Some diners are costumed in muted grays and whites, blacks and browns. Several visitors wear rakish eye stripes, fashion eyewear on woodland actors -- such as the Bewick’s wren, dressed in monochrome but dapper with eyestripe and jaunty tail, or the even bolder eyestripe adding to the remarkable rust and steel blue wardrobe of the red-breasted nuthatch. A few other suet eaters are blessed with full-on glam — the electric yellow face and throat of the Townsend warblers, the glowing red yarmulke on the male downy woodpecker’s head.

Our set-up is designed to exclude larger birds as well as squirrels and rats. Downy woodpeckers easily feed by clinging upside down, and Downy’s bigger cousin Hairy could too if our setting was more wild. But starlings and jays have the wrong feet, try as they do. Squirrels can make the leap and hold on tight so we add one more complication — hot pepper suet. Birds are insensitive to cayenne, but squirrels (and rats) take one bite, shake their faces, and jump off.

Although the list of our feeder visitors is extensive, as snow becomes deeper and deeper and the days with snow add up, the visits trail off. We will watch over the next few weeks and try to guess. Some will probably return. Some may have succumbed to cold and hunger, some may be caught by hungry raptors and corvids, or by bored cats. Many more will simply disperse from their winter flocks to pair up and breed, and shift to the living forage found under leaves and in flower buds and on the wing. It is hard to say whether the feeders are more for them or for us but in the meantime we will keep putting suet (hot pepper) out each winter indefinitely.

Glen

Winter warriors

… For it it is in the dew of little things we find our morning and are refreshed. Kahlil Gilbran 

It has been 15 months since our last post. We have excuses. But as convincing as our reasons may seem, as I begin to write they seem lame. And while it has over a year since our last post, it been ten years since our first post. Our first test of the blogging world was a post about hummingbirds in the snow. Now, mid February 2019, we have heaps of snow, and Anna’s hummingbirds (Calypte anna) dine at two feeders. Snow for us Puget Sounders is unpredictable, and this amount almost unprecedented. Excuses for not writing will continue to throw obstacles in my path, but I shall take the continued tenacity and adaptability of small birds as a nudge to lament less and celebrate more, this confluece of time and weather a nudge to return to writing.

no hummer or no camera or not focused -- oh well

Each feeder is guarded by a dominant hummingbird and stealthily visited by some determined usurpers. The main claimant feeds frequently and when not feeding he or she sits on a patrol branch scanning the territory for interlopers. Although the food resource is bountiful enough to share, sharing is an idea absent from a hummingbird’s temperament, and pitched battles are regularly waged with battering wings and menacing needle-like bills.

perched, watching

This warrior trait may aid their success. Beyond our own winter visitors we know there is a successful winter population of Anna’s here (in Olympia WA), in part because of the active correspondence we read on the neighborhood listserv. Numerous readers have shared weather alerts, and feeder advice during frigid temperatures, and how long they’ve been feeding and seeing hummingbirds in winter. (The gleanings about care follow.) We are certain that winter resident Anna’s will soon be joined by Rufous hummingbirds, (Selasphorus rufus), our early spring migrant, just as we are certain that power outages and ice are fleeting. But as I write we are still deeply in winter.

Like the Anna's, I choose to embrace the snow and accept the limitations and turmoil that the snow imposes. Snow disrupts routine and shakes loose sentiment, and reopens worlds of both joy and grief locked away forgotten. I am lucky that in me the optimism of the young man usually overpowers the fears of the aging one. Perhaps it is true that hummingbirds are guides to the spirit world. They are little but they are fierce and as our lives are upended by uncertainties I am filled with gratitudes that we have mighty little birds to both be faithful to and to lean on.

Glen


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Winter hummingbird tips and observations:
 • Mixing the sugar nectar: 1c water with 1/4c white sugar, no coloring, boiling water optional
 • The time they first show up to feed: 20 to 30 min before sunrise
 • How to keep the sugar syrup thawed when temperatures drop below ~ 28º F :
 = Bring feeder in each frozen night, replace before dawn — or
 = Microwave (30 seconds) in the morning, if feeder is free of metal — or
 = Wrap feeder with non-LED Christmas lights (note: LED’s don’t produce enough heat)
 = Daytime, if days also will be sub-freezing, tape a chemical toe warmer to the feeder’s underside.