Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Phoebe the Allens Hummingbird

This is Phoebe the little hummingbird. I to have jumped on the bandwagon to sketch her.
Two Blogger friends, Maree  http://naturesketchers.blogspot.com/2010/01/allens-hummingbird-maree.html. and Vickie  http://vickiehenderson.blogspot.com/2010_01_01_archive.html. have also painted sketches of her sitting on her eggs.
 PHOEBE

Sketched from a live video-cam link http://www.ustream.tv/channel/Hummingbird-Nest-Cam. set up next to a house near a rosebush in a yard in Orange County California. It was quite easy sketching her as she ignores the camera lens on her and I had the opportunity to really study her. One can see her from different angles and get to see her markings quite well as she turns around to settle in the opposite direction.

This little hummingbird is sitting on two eggs at the moment and are expected to hatch any day now. So follow this link if you are keen to get a good sighting of Phoebe and the hatching of her eggs. The eggs were laid on the 2nd & 4th of Jan and are incubated for about 17 days. Apparently this is her 5th clutch laid in the same yard.  It's so exciting watching the live feed of this busy little lady who flits in and out of her nest and wriggles around re-arranging her eggs. I must admit, I do get carried away with watching her... it's addictive.

We do not have hummingbirds here in South Africa, but they are similar to our Sugarbirds and Sunbirds.

Till later.......

7 comments:

Maree Clarkson said...

Wow, this is really great Debbie! Phoebe must be the most famous Hummingbird ever now!

Debbie said...

Thanks Maree... you are not half bad either, mind you! Isn't she just great to watch...... have you seen her new baby?

Maree Clarkson said...

After all my watching for hours, I missed the hatching! When I checked back yesterday morning, it was night-time there, and then later in the day I forgot! Damn! Will check on her today.

Vickie said...

Hi, Debbie. Love your sketch! She must be the most loved hummer in the world right now. I saw both babies yesterday. So special!

Debbie said...

Hi Vickie.... thanks for popping in. Aren't they adorable.Apparently they are about an inch long at the moment and growing fast!!!!!

Maree, I missed both hatchings too, but we are in different time zones and are not always available when the action happens. But fun to watch in any case.

Debbie said...
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Debbie said...
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