Thanksgiving week, I spent driving with some friends from Baton Rouge south into the Lower Rio Grande Valley for some birding, then back up through west Texas and on to New Mexico and Arizona before flying back from Phoenix. Although this isn't the busiest time of year for hummingbirds, I got to see several species in Texas (mostly Buff-bellied, along with a handful of Rufous, Ruby-throats, and Black-chinned, and at least one Allen's). In Arizona, of course, many species have migrated south for the winter, but the resident Anna's were still out in many locations. I also got to see a beautiful hybrid at Boyce-Thompson State Park and Arboretum. The bird is believed to be a cross between a Broad-billed and a Violet-crowned, and its appearance certainly suggests that parentage as well. It has the crown and tail of a typical Broad-billed, and a bluish-greenish back that certainly looks like a Broad-billed, but it has the clear white underparts, including throat, of a Violet-crowned. Its voice was definitely more like a Broad-billed as well. I tried to photograph the bird several times but it was a busy weekend in the park and hard to get the camera on the bird before it spooked.



As a consolation prize, I did get shots of a very nice adult male Broad-billed still at the park. Unfortunately, my photography skills are not nearly the equal of those many of you possess.









And it was a nice thing to find when I got home that my female Rufous is still present, paint mark and all.



Kevin Morgan

Baton Rouge, LA

Kevin,

Sounds like you had a wonderful trip and thanks for sharing your photographs.

Suchie

Circumstances prevent me from traveling any farther than Louisiana, so thanks for posting about your trip. The Broad-billed is beautiful! Or I guess I should say handsome. I think your composition is perfect.

Joan Garvey - Metairie, LA Zone 9

Great account of your trip Kevin but I really want to see that cross between the Broad-billed and a Violet-crowned so you will have to chug back across the border and stay there until you get pics LOL! I bet that was really something to witness even though you didn't get any photos

Penny
Niagara Falls, NY
USDA zone 6a/6b
Heat zone 4
Sunset zone 39

Penny,

Luckily, I won't have to make the trek: I did a little research on the web.

I knew the bird had been present for a while in the park, but I didn't know that it had been there for more than two years! It was originally discovered in September, 2006, and was banded in November of that year. I found this link to pictures of the bird (and there are others, if you google for "hybrid hummingbird boyce-thompson").

http://www.sabo.org/photoalb/hbhybta.htm

Now I don't feel so bad teasing you with the news!

Kevin Morgan
Baton Rouge, LA

Hi Kevin. Nice shot of the Broad-billed. Sounds like you had a nice trip. Hummers are getting scarce here in my part of LA.

http://MichaelDanielHo.com

Quote: "And it was a nice thing to find when I got home that my female Rufous is still present, paint mark and all."

Kevin, this was such a sad way to end what started as a beautiful post.

Why do you have to paint the head of "YOUR" rufous? The answers given previously is so that the stress of repeatedly trapping and handling the hummer over and over again can be avoided. Please take note, this means the initial trapping, handling, banding, and painting is very stressful to the hummingbird.

I really don't believe that this is being done with any benefit to the birds. This just seems to be, on a large scale a record keeping project, much like some folks like to keep records of the weather. On a small scale, banding and painting hummingbirds in your own yard is just a way to heighten one's own hummingbird experience. Why wonder if that's a new bird coming to visit when you can make darned sure?

Nature has it's cycles, and hummingbird numbers will go up and down accordingly. Migration and nesting patterns will change and adapt with the needs of the birds as well. We aren't going to cease building, farming or mining, or get any South American country to do the same based on banding data. To think that you're needed by the hummingbirds is delusional. Hummingbirds are going to survive despite all of us.

In reading the following document, it states that 3,930 hummingbirds were handled from the year 2000 until 2008, yet the entire page is just data. Not one mention of "helping the birds", nor stating a desire or need to help the birds.
http://losbird.org/bulletin/08newfield.html

Kevin, I'm asking in the most civil way that I know of, for you and all others to please consider ceasing the barbaric practice of needlessly banding and painting hummingbirds. "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you". The hummingbirds never asked to be banded.

Kindly,
Walter

p.s. I'm totally taken aback that no one else on this forum finds this type of activity appalling.

Walter I have been absent from the forum for a month or so and do belive I missed your joining. Apparently I missed where you introduced yourself to all of us hummingbird loves. Would you please direct me to the post where you joined us so I can learn more about you.



As you can see from my signature I live in the deep south. Compared to most here I am a newbee but I do enjoy growing flowers to entice the beautiful Ruby to my yards from the early spring until early fall. I am trying to learn and with the professionals that frequent this forum I feel that I am heading in the right direction. I do hope I can learn from you too.

Dianne

Southeast Alabama

Heat Zone 8

Sunset Zone 31

Kevin I am happy you had such a good trip. Love the pictures.

Dianne
Southeast Alabama
Heat Zone 8
Sunset Zone 31

Walter, it looks like you are the only one posting who thinks banding is barbaric. True, everyone is entitled to their opinion, but it isn't one shared by this group of hummer lovers. Like I said, maybe you shouldn't read these posts because the banding is going to continue as research is necessary. Nancy is going on 30 years in her research and she isn't going to stop now because you don't see the benefit of it. She sees her position as that of an educator but some people refuse to be educated.

Joan Garvey - Metairie, LA Zone 9

Kevin - What a wonderful account of your trip. Its very interesting to see that hummer hybrid - thanks for sharing the pictures. Very impressive - would love to see it in person.

We learn so much from all yours and Nancy's sharings of your trips and your banding experiences - each time its as interesting and informative as the last. I can not tell you how much I have learned these past few years and most of it has been due to reading all your postings.

The best of course has been my fortune to have been with you, Nancy and Joan on some banding expeditions. For that I am very grateful - an opportunity like that doesn't come often. Just being there and seeing how very gently those hummers are handled while being banded and then to see them flying around afterwards, going to the feeders and flowers is just proof to me that the learning from all this is invaluable. To know some of them have returned to the exact same spot on the exact same date is just so exciting. So much more to be learned - I only wish there was a bander near me but there just aren't enough who are licensed to do so. It would be great to know if one of mine ever made it down south and was captured by someone who could verify that trip!

My appreciation and thanks to all of you.

Carol
Milford, CT
Zone 6

Walter,

I am going to make this post as simple and clear as possible, so that (hopefully) nothing I say will be misconstrued.

I believe knowledge is better than ignorance. I believe that if knowledge can be gained without causing harm to a living creature, then it is probably worthwhile to do so, for its own sake. In the case of hummingbird migration (which is the area that most interests me, with regard to these birds), the knowledge we gain can be used to protect their critical habitat. It may not always be used -- people do make decisions on land use with other considerations -- but it at least becomes a factor that CAN be considered.

I refer to the bird in my yard as "my" Rufous because she has chosen to spend two successive winters in my yard. I would not know that if she were not banded; the banding obviously did not discourage her in the least from returning to my yard. There are plenty of other places within a short, 5-minute flight in which she could have taken up residence, if avoiding being handled were a concern of hers. It clearly wasn't. Nor has it been an issue for the hundreds of other returnee birds in various yards over the years, some of which returned and were recaptured five, six or more times. A bird which is able to navigate from the Pacific Northwest to the same yard in the southeast United States, despite all the territorial changes in between each year, has to be perceptive enough to recognize a cage trap, and if being handled were that traumatic to the bird, they would almost never return to the same site, much less allow themselves to be recaptured.

It is my belief, and the belief of most people I know who have studied hummingbirds, that there are far more stressful things in the hummingbird's natural environment than being temporarily trapped and handled. They are chased by predators, they fight each other at feeders for territory control, they migrate hundreds or thousands of miles twice a year through all sorts of habitat and weather. There is always a chance - a small chance, yes, but a chance - that in any sort of scientific study, a subject may be injured or even killed, but we do everything possible to minimize that.

I do not tell you all this to convince you that you should approve of banding, be it hummingbirds, raptors, or anything in between. It is to point out that I have already considered the ethics of the practice, and am satisfied that the knowledge gains clearly outweigh the short-term inconvenience (and yes, that's what I think it is) for the birds.

We use the paint marks for multiple reasons, but the simplest explanation is that it lowers the already incredibly low odds that a bird might be injured in retrapping, trying to read its number. More importantly, it also enables us to see when another, similar bird of the same species arrives in the same yard--because it's not (yet) marked. We gain knowledge of arrival and departure rates this way. We learn whether birds move around from site to site during the winter. Basically, it enables us to observe a particular bird, knowing its specific identity, without having to retrap it. That does not mean that "the initial trapping, handling, banding, and painting is very stressful to the hummingbird," as you put it. It merely means we try to minimize the stress, no matter how low it may already be.

And yes, this is a record-keeping project, in part. Most science is built upon the collection of data. The data gathered from my yard, on its own, is insignificant. The data gathered from all the yards in which winter hummingbirds are banded, across the southeast, is not. And because that banding information is all reported to a central authority - which, by the way, ensures that new banders are trained by someone who knows what they're doing, and which won't issue a banding permit for someone who is untrained or who does not have a legitimate research project - tens of thousands of pieces of the puzzle can be gradually assembled because of the work of dozens of banders and hundreds of hummingbird hosts. Just because you have not been able, in your obviously cursory attempts, to find the pre-defined conclusions you think must be present in order to justify banding, does not mean that solid research is not being accomplished, and it does not mean that we have learned nothing.

But I repeat my statement from earlier: I'm not asking you to change your mind about banding. No person who has hummingbirds visiting his or her yard ever has to permit it, if they don't wish; and that can be for whatever reason makes sense to him (or her). What I'm asking YOU to do is stop mischaracterizing what banders do. I'm comfortable with the ethics of this field.

And on that note, I think my position is clear. I'm not interested in debating the rightness or wrongness of the practice of banding.

Kevin Morgan

Kevin - I read your reply in detail, and all I can say is "Fair Enough". I appreciate your civility and patience. Neither one of us is going to change the other's mind - and though I'm just not fond of the practice - I feel it is appropriate and fair for me to "pipe down".

Wishing you Peace.

Walter

Walter,

And since fair's fair, I certainly wish you the same. Your posts were civil, and I didn't see any reason to lower the level of discourse; I know you're speaking out based on your beliefs and I think that's understandable.

Kevin Morgan
Baton Rouge, LA

First let me say to Kevin thank you for the additional information on the hybrid and the link to Sheri's site. If this bird hadn't been banded previously you wouldn't have known that the bird has been there for 2 years and obviously quite content to stay. We also wouldn't know that they even do hybridize which I would have never known.

I have never had the good fortune to witness a banding of any species but if the opportunity does aford itself I will look forward to it. In fact if my population had not been so eratic this past summer I had planned on having a bander come and band in my yard in hopes of learning more about their migrations routes.

This is one person that really does appreciate the work y'all do as I have learned much more than I ever knew before y'all came to the forum.

Penny
Niagara Falls, NY
USDA zone 6a/6b
Heat zone 4
Sunset zone 39

Walter.... when you expressed your opinion about banding on the thread about "my" Buffy, I have to say my first reaction was indignation. Like Kevin, I believe the data that's being collected is valuable. I also know from first hand experience that the hummers seem to find the process less stressful than many of the humans involved do, especially their "caretakers." My second reaction though, was concern for you.
If the original post had included anything negative at all regarding the hummer, I'd have taken your words at face value. But the bird was a happy camper, revisiting my yard right after his release, spending more time there than he'd previously done. Still, the story broke your heart.
You're obviously an intelligent, empathetic bird lover, very much like the members of this forum. The fact that you can see nothing but agony where we see positive interaction, makes me wonder if you're depressed.
I know I'm going out on a limb here, feel free to tell me off if I'm "way off." I'm not afraid of looking foolish, do it all the time. Anyway, I just want to say, this is a very caring group of people and you'll find support here if you need it.




Lizette, New Orleans, La.
USDA Zone 9

I think that most of the time if not all, these tiny jewels that brighten our days have a sense that they are not being threatened. As I said before I haven't been able to experience a banding yet and I may never be able to experience it but I have had to rescue other little birds that got them selves into unsafe predicaments at my home usually in the garage. Many times they were panicky in the beginning until I was able to secure them and take them out to safety but they by no means showed any fear or trauma once they were secured (rather than saying captured) and released and most of the time they stayed right in the yard or in the immediate area and continued to come to the feeders. I have had some come back to a feeder with me standing right there adding seed. Now granted these are not hummers but hummers are generally more apt to interact with their human benafactors than other wild birds. If the birds were being harmed or caused undo stress in any way I believe they would be gone in a heartbeat.



Penny
Niagara Falls, NY
USDA zone 6a/6b
Heat zone 4
Sunset zone 39