The Hummingbird Circus

"Was that something beautiful, amazing, wonderful, extraordinary, beautiful?"

It was a fine morning indeed for hummingbirds. I counted at least four of them in our backyard: two different females, a juvenile male, and a mature ruby throat male. They swooped and chased each other and chattered a mile a minute. It was something to see!

I grabbed my camera and positioned myself by the front feeder, the one nearest the butterfly garden, and I got lots of great shots. I'm including two of them here: the one above of the juvenile male, with its beard shadow, the master of ceremonies, really, constantly chirping and chasing the others; a force to be reckoned with.

I'm also including a photo of one of the females in the extras. Isn't she just gorgeous? Look at the intricate detail on her wings, and how the green just shines. You can see why I would love them so. I had always dreamed of having a yard full of hummingbirds, and now I am finally living that dream.

Later in the day, my husband and I went to Jim's in Bellefonte and grabbed some takeout: an Italian hoagie for him, a chef's salad for me. We ate our food at a picnic table under a tiny pavilion at Governor's Park in Bellefonte, on our way to Bald Eagle State Park for an afternoon swim.

So we had our lunch, but on our way to Bald Eagle, we changed our minds, and we took off for Black Moshannon State Park instead. My husband has swum there a number of times this summer, but this was a first for me. How interesting and unusual that we ended up somewhere entirely different from where we originally intended to go!

As we arrived at the park, storm clouds were gathering over the water (see the extra photos for a shot), and suddenly it began to rain, but only a little bit. We drove around the park once and it was done. We got our swim in and as we watched, the clouds turned threatening again and the thunder began in earnest; we packed up our gear and left before the coming storm.

As I have a number of photos for this day, let's give this posting two soundtrack songs. One is for the hummingbird circus (the little quote above is from this song): Yes, with Circus of Heaven.

And the other is for the storm clouds gathering over Black Moshannon . . . the storm that chased us twice, but never caught us: Waylon Jennings and Jessi Colter, with Storms Never Last.