Hummingbird in the house

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This little lady got into the house this morning and had a hard time
finding her way out. As you can see, she has somewhat unusual literary
tastes for a bird.

Comments

[heliopausa]

What a treat! (though birds in the house are always somewhat disturbing. Maybe that's the link to SF?)

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Yes, I had very mixed feelings about the whole episode, because on the one hand it was exciting, and it was certainly the only chance I've ever had to get a closeup of a hummingbird, and on the other hand I was worried that she would hurt herself banging against the windows trying to get out, and I could tell that she was stressed. But all's well that ends well -- the moment she got outside she zipped away, so obviously she was okay!

[edenfalling]

What a beautiful bird!

(How did you get her back outside? The only time I had to deal with an indoor bird -- years ago, a very confused sparrow got lost in the display windows at the store where I worked -- I trapped it in a muffin basket and covered the open side with a clipboard. But hummingbirds are so fast that trapping them seems like a tricky proposition.)

[transposable_element]

There is a lot of advice online about how to induce a hummingbird to find the nearest exit. I couldn't cover up all the windows to make the egress more obvious because one whole wall of the room is windows (this isn't our house, but it gives you an idea), so I put brightly colored objects outside each potential exit to attract her attention. Just after I did this the bird found her way out, so maybe it helped, or maybe it was a coincidence.

If that hadn't worked, the only thing I could have done was wait for the bird to exhaust herself and go into a torpor, which is the just about the only way to make it possible to catch a hummingbird. This can happen pretty quickly with hummingbirds if they are unable to feed, because they have such a high metabolism (basically they go into hibernation every night when they can't feed). Obviously this is not good for the bird, and you have to have sugar water ready for it right away, so I'm glad it didn't come to that.

I saw a hummingbird feeding in the back yard later, and since they are very territorial it was probably the same one. I hope she's okay.

[syrena_of_the_lake]

OMG. I love it so much I just wrote an entire story about a hummingbird and books. (it was going to be a 3SF but wound up at 5 and a half pages of my notebook... oops.) I'll be able to post it in a couple days (no computer right now), and will drop you a note when it's up... :-)

[transposable_element]

Cool! I'm looking forward to seeing it.