We had one or 2 maybe all summer. I saw them once and thats it. They are very beautiful.

They are starting their winter migration now so we northern gardeners will see lots of them passing thru. They really appreciate the nectar since they have hundreds of miles to cover (and an uncertain food supply) before they reach their winter destination.

Rats, I haven't been on the board for a while so I just saw this. I saw two hummers in September, both looked about the same but I haven't had a chance to ID them. One in my backyard and one a couple towns away. They were bigger than I used to see when I lived in Washington State and mainly silver all over. It's the first time I've seen any here since I moved about 18 years ago. I just love seeing them--it's almost like seeing a unicorn or something! I was in Colorado this summer and saw two yellow ones in Estes Park playing among the aspens.

wow, by any chance are any of you folks in the city proper? I've always been tempted to try attracting them, but a lot of people have told me not to bother.

One of the hummingbirds I saw was in Evanston. The one in my back yard was hovering around a Rose of Sharon.

I have had tons of Hummers this past summer...they love the Indica Cannas and Salvias. They seem to have migrated now, though.

They hang out in our suburban Milwaukee garden all summer. I don't put out a feeder, they're attracted by the plants in our garden. One is still around but probably not much longer. They were feeding off the russian sage this August/ I hadn't seen them there before.

I've never seen any hummingbirds in the city. Although I have seen two birds I'd never seen before in my life. One was a cardinal and the other I'm not sure but he had a yellow chest with a grey body and was about the size of my thumb. He visited my yard a lot this year to get to my seeds before I could collect them.

It was nice seeing something other than those dingy, little brown birds and those dark feathered ones with the yellow specles.

mrbrownthumb: I think you were maybe seeing a goldfinch? The females can look a sort of grey/olive color compared to the males (who, in summer, look like they are wearing little sunglasses). They love to pick the seeds out of flowerheads. I don't cut my dead garden stuff back until spring because the birds pick seeds out of the coneflowers, etc., all winter. This year I had a goldfinch couple who would eat all the seeds out of my sunflowers. They would perch on the back of the sunflower head and rip off all the top petals so they could lean over and get the seeds more easily. It made all my sunflower look like they had beards, since they were all bald on top with petals only on the bottom. (I'd been blaming the squirrels until I caught a goldfinch in the act of denuding my sunflowers.)

I still have hummers coming by--haven't seen one yet this morning, but I saw a fat one yesterday, buzzing around the pineapple sage. Also saw our first junco of the year incredibly early--a female on Oct. 7th. Usually we don't see the juncos until November sometime--she must have been on her way further north.

Here is a link that might be useful: goldfinch

glassmouse,

That's is the bird and they did the same thing to my sunflowers.

:0)

I've seen humming birds before and they are always attacted to my Salvia. Haven't seen any in the last two years. I live in Uptown in Chicago by the lake.

ahh, you lucky folks on the east "coast" of Chi-town.

I think my proximity to the expressway in Avondale prevents hummingbirds (or purple martins), but we are starting to get regular hawk sightings!