Last month Robert Lang sent some lovely photos of hummingbirds, which have at last reached the front of the queue.
From a recent trip to Costa Rica, we saw some beautiful hummingbirds at the Monteverde Biological Reserve and lower down on the slopes of Arenal volcano. At Monteverde, there is a hummingbird gallery with feeders set up that attract a wide variety to both the feeders and the general area, but we also saw several birds up along the mountain trails.
A Green-Crowned Brilliant (Heliodoxa jacula):
The most striking was the Violet Sabrewing (Campylopterus hemileucurus):
The colors come from diffraction of microstructure in the feathers, and so the color varies strongly with angle. From many angles, the Violet Sabrewing looks dark blue, but its downcurved bill is fairly distinctive:
And a Purple-Throated Mountaingem (Lampornis calolaemus). Why no purple throat? This is a female.
My favorite photo was of a Rufous-Tailed Hummingbird (Amazilia tzacatl), which we saw on a farm near Arenal volcano:
And another photo that shows the entire bird for identification:
Last, a shot of one of the feeders at Mondeverde. I wasn’t able to ID any of these; if any readers can assist, I’d be most appreciative.
And, from Oz, some stars from reader Tim Anderson:
This is a picture of the Orion Nebula (Messier Catalogue number 42 – it sits at the tip of Orion’s “sword”). At this time of year in Australia, the Orion constellation is high in the sky early in the night, making it easy to find.This picture is a single 60-second image taken with an Atik Infinity astronomical camera through an 80mm aperture telescope. The sky is heavily light polluted from surrounding streetlights (which explains the rather foggy background), but it captured a lot of the complex dust clouds around the nebula core.
Fantastic photography…………..
The bottom left hummer is a Green Violetear, I think.
Yes, the middle one appears to also be a Green Violetear based on the tail pattern. The one on the right looks like an immature Green-crowned Brilliant because of the long forked tail and cinnamon under the eye.
The green hummingbird is my favourite. I didn’t know there existed one that was pretty much all one colour like that.
The Orion Nebula is something I wasn’t to photograph one day…when I have energy to stay up at night, can endure more cold (Orion is best seen in the winter in the northern hemisphere) and when I have the time to set up all my stuff on my telescope.
BTW, I found it amusing that Orion appears upside down when you are in the Southern Hemisphere — so not now the Greeks thought of him, I’m sure! 🙂
“Birds are a miracle because they prove to us there is a finer, simpler state of being which we may strive to attain.”
Douglas Coupland
Love the colorful hummers. That bright purple is amazing.
How wonderful! Thanks.
Thank you, Robert & Tim!
Minor quibble: The Orion Nebula is the middle “star” of Orion’s “sword”, not the tip.