Picture of the day - August 16, 2007

Hummingbirds at an "all-you-can-eat buffet"

Photo courtesy of Jim & Dolores White. Our friends Jim and Dolores White of Surgoinsville, Tennessee sent in this wonderful photo of a pair of hummingbirds "hovering" around a feeder, apparently trying to decide which "table" they would like to sit at. I have had the opportunity to sit and watch countless hummers dine at various feeders in my lifetime, and it's quite rare when one just flies in and heads straight for one of the feeding holes. Like a finicky eater at a buffet lunch, they seem to want to "stand" there for a moment and check out all of the available options before committing to one. Hummingbirds are among God's most graceful creatures, flittering here and there, wings flapping so quickly that they become virtually invisible to the naked eye. They can hover like a helicopter, fly sideways, straight up and down... why they can even fly backwards! When God designed the birds of the air, He gave them the ability to ignore the law of gravity, but He apparently decided that the hummingbird should simply ignore several other "laws" of physics as well! Well, now that it's mid-August, summertime will soon be packing her bags and taking off on her yearly vacation to the southern hemisphere - and the hummingbirds will soon be gone as well. But for now, we can still sit on the porch and watch nature's most gifted "pilots" flitter here and there as they try to find a suitable "chair" at the "dinner table"!   Visit the POTD Archives for previous "Pictures Of The Day"!     Submit a photo of your own!            Why I publish the "Picture of the Day"