Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire A really cool hummingbird.

Last week an albino hummingbird was reported in Leakey in the Texas Hill Country on Birds of Texas, a Facebook group. Turns out they’re rare but regular. I had never heard of this before but no reason I guess hummingbirds shouldn’t get that too like most every other species does.

Someone posted this IIRC from the Dallas area. A partial albino. The really cool thing is this hummingbird, a mature male rubythroat, has to be more’n a year old. Meaning he’s on at least his second trip back to the tropics, having survived his first trip as a new fledgling, wintered in Central America, migrated back north in the spring and spent the summer wherever that was up north, and is now heading back south.





I have no idea how lucky he was impressing the girls with that set-up, coulda been a long and frustrating summer.

Piebald!

A “partial albino” is like being a little bit pregnant, you either is or you ain’t. 😀

I suppose you could call the “partial albino” hummingbird a piebald hummingbird? In any case that’s pretty cool to see since I don’t think many people have seen a partial albino or full albino hummingbird so you’re in an exclusive club Birdy. 👍🏼

Nice. We don’t have any of those around here.

Years ago we had a chickadee come through during the winter and the parts of its body that would normally be gray, were white. It was a pretty striking bird. I tried to get a picture of it but never could.

Had a weird hummingbird show up here at the campground yesterday between downpours. Sitting on the deck minding my own business when there was a great roaring from behind my head. Jerked around and there was a hummer 3 feet away hovered and watching me. Like he was either waiting to be fed or surprised the flower moved. Not sure what kind of flower is silver grey.

Have seen a horde of different hummers in various parts of the US - but never any as different/interesting as that one. Good for you. Thanks for posting.

Leucistic, not partial albino...commonly called piebald...the things that stick from biology 49 years ago...

We had a pretty good storm blow in at daylight yesterday and I found a hummer in the pool while I was skimming leaves. I plucked him out and dried her off the best I could. Set the little girl on a flower pot under the back porch and about a hour later she flew up in an oak tree. Hopefully she wasn’t too stressed out to survive.

Tks but to me calling ‘em leucistic is about like calling buffalo “bison”. Ya I know the genetic mechanism is different but so is the mosaic genetic expression of patchy white birds different from pale-all over leucistic birds.

Just to clarify for folks; I didn’t see the bird in the photo it was photographed up by Dallas.

Anyways, in the urban setting where I’m at the unprecedented abundance of four or five migrant hummingbirds at a time and the wars that ensues of one or two weeks ago has abruptly subsided. Now we’re down to the usual just one at a time and not every day. I dunno what anomaly in the heat and drought around here brung them through in such numbers.

Migration related; I should have heard a bunch of upland sandpipers headed to the Argentinian pampas passing over by now but have heard exactly one all season. I dunno what it’s been like on the Northern Plains this summer or again how the local conditions here affected migration.

Nerd.

“Nerd”? That’s it?

I guess you ain’t had your coffee yet.

Most of my black-chins are gone. We had a big storm on Labor Day, coinciding with the full moon. My birds have consistently left at the September full moon year after year. I'm told it's not connected, but it's a helluva coincidence. Had a female migrator come by and sip from our hanging plants, then from some regular flowers before she spotted my feeder. I could almost see her eyebrows shoot up when she did. Zoomed up and slurped her belly full while I grinned. I think she waved her thanks as she departed.

We now see some Orioles coming through. They try to get into the hummingbird feeders.

Of course if it’s not an adult male, good luck separating black chins from ruby-throats. One source had that black-chins are inclined to wag their tails rapidly when feeding from a hover where Ruby throats are more inclined to keep theirs still. I dunno if the wagging tail thing on the part of black-chins squares with what you might have seen.

It is gratifying when a hummer finds the feeder and then feeds uninterrupted for five seconds at a time, frequently returning. You know that bird was running on empty and you just gave it a leg up.

Fugkin' nerd?

atta boy.

Heard one this morning while feeding the jays and quail their scratch and peanuts.

Still have visitors to the feeder hanging out back.

Ice in the lawn hose yesterday morning, so they won't be around long.

Had a Ruby stuck in my workshop yesterday, spent 15 minutes beating itself off my lights. I finally was able to corral/push it out while flying with a leaf rake. He flew out and rested on an oak tree, then went about his business and was gone.

Birdie, if it was a Ruby here in Utah, it was REALLY lost. We have 90% Black-chins, a few Rufous, and the occasional Broad-tailed. The little girl I saw the other day came in to hanging fuchsia flowers, then hit another of my wife's many flowers before discovering the feeder - which she IMMEDIATELY recognized.

Incidentally, it is time once again for me to remind people that the old idea of taking down your feeders to "force" the birds to migrate is cruel and possibly murderous. The poor little guys need that energy to start their journey, not being forced to leave with empty tanks. Leave them up until after the first hard frost; that will help 99% of the migrators. If anything, increase the sugar content of your syrup.