Garden Fresh Vegetables and Hummingbird Hissy Fits

First, a little something fresh from our garden.

 
Our garden, with the tree farm in the background.  We have tomatoes, zucs, cucs, onions and green peppers.

 

Gad zukes! That will make some fine zuccini bread.  A bounty headed for the dinner table.

 

Dinner from a couple of nights ago. A little yummy for the tummy.

As we dined outside, we were paid a visit by a tiny feathered friend.  As I watched, I was reminded of something funny involving Sam and a hummingbird a couple of years ago.

Have you ever been cussed out by a hummingbird?

Sam has.  That's one feather in Sam's cap that not too many people can lay claim to.  <grin>

And better yet, it was one of those husband-wife moments where the husband ignored something the wife said, and...

It was spring time at the cabin.  Sam is busy outside doing Sam stuff and I'm busy inside doing Dona stuff.  Throughout the morning, during several trips inside, Sam leaves the front door to the cabin open as he exits, and I keep closing the door.  There is no screen on the front door and I don't want bugs or other uninvited guests inside.  This I mention to my husband a couple of times. 

Then I go outside to fill the bird feeders with seeds, shutting the door behind me.  The hummingbirds are very active right now and their feeder is on the front porch, just a few feet from the front door, while the seed feeders for all the other birds are hanging off or attached to several trees.  I don't want to try to chase a hummingbird out of the cabin, you know, so I want the door kept closed.  On the way back from the bird seed feeders I noticed the front door open, again.  I see Sam milling around out by one of the wood piles.  I start walking toward him when a small blur and that familiar whirl of wings grabs my attention.

"Honey, why is the door open?" I ask as I watch a hummingbird dart about on the front porch.

From behind the wood I hear, "Because I left it open."

"Why?"  The hummer stops momentarily at the feeder.

"To air the cabin out a bit."

"We've got all the windows open for that.  Besides, I don't want the hummingbirds going inside."  The hummer has left the feeder.

Sam looks up at me with that roll-the-eyes-in-the-back-of-head-are-you-kidding-me look and replies, quite sternly, "They won't go into the cabin."   

Famous last words.

I watch for a moment as the hummer hovers on the porch right in front of the doorway.  Before I can do or say anything, it vanishes from sight, whirling away on a little hummer adventure, inside the cabin.

Timing is everything.

Mildly amused, I reply, "Really?"

"Yes," says he as he returns to his task by the wood pile.

"Are you sure?" I ask..

With a deep, heavy sigh, slightly annoyed, he replies, "Yes, Bernie, I'm sure."

"Good," I say as I walk toward the cabin.  "Because one just went through the open door and is now flying around inside the cabin."  Out of the corner of my eye I see Sam stand up with that deer in the headlights look on his face.  Before I disappear onto the porch, I flash him a quick smile.  "Come on, you let 'em in.  You get to help 'em out."

The hummer is now upstairs, feeling very trapped and is banging into the sliding glass door in a desparate attempt to get out of this cage.  I'm back outside in 2 shakes.  "This would be a good time to get in here since it's about to knock itself out on the glass upstairs," I holler.

Sam steps through the threshold within seconds and heads upstairs, after grabbing the video camera first; prosperity's sake and all (obviously at this point he knows this is not going to happen again).  I'm manning the front door to close it in the event the inside hummer should fly out, and to prevent any outside from flying in.  I hear Sam call down for me to bring him two paper plates, which I do.

I arrive on the scene and the poor little tiny hummingbird is sitting on the floor next to the sliding door track.  Sam has the video camera going just inches from the bird's head, and the bird is not budging; it's either too exhausted or too petrified to move.  Or, worse yet, it is injured.  I hand over the plates to Sam and return to my post by the front door.  The sliding glass door lock is jammed, hence the need for the paper plates...can't just open the door to let the little guy fly off on his own accord.  A few minutes later, Sam steps down the stairs holding the two plates together horizontally with his hands.  I close the front door and follow him out the back door, fawning over the safety and condition of the tiny prisoner now locked between the paper plates.  I am assured the bird is fine, but am not convinced.  Sam lifts the top plate up and the disoriented hummer sits for a few seconds, uncertain of what to do.  Then in an instant it flies off to a nearby branch where it lands.

"See, Bernie, it's fine," says Sam.

That's when the hissy fit began.  This tiny little creature proceeds to squeek and cheep, quite profusely, at Sam, for the next fifteen minutes.  Hummingbirds do not land and stay in one place for very long, but this little guy sat on that branch and chewed Sam out good!  Up one side and down the other.  On and on.  I think he even had a really pissed look on his little hummingbird face.  Fiercely pissed.  Both of us stood on the deck, laughing as the tiny creature shook, and ruffled, and puffed out his feathers during his lengthy tirade.  That high-pitched squeeky shrill just sent chills of fear down both our spines.  Fifteen minutes later, fully satified he made his point quite clear to the both of us, the hummer flew off.

Of course, I had to have the last word, you know. ;)

No other hummingbirds have ventured into the cabin since that day.

Last fall Sam installed a screen on the front door.

 

Now, I'm off to make that wonderous zuccini into some handsome loaves of bread.  :)  And pack the trailer for our trip into the mountains this weekend.

When I get back, I'll tell you all about Dump Cake. ;-)  It's very, very good.