Yellow Rumped Warbler hovering to eat the ripe berries of the Brazilian Pepper Tree. The Yellow Rumped Warblers aka "Butter Butts" have returned for winter. Not ones to come to feeders they scour the trees for small bugs and have adapted to take advantage of the ripening of the Brazilian Peppers in December to provide an arrival feast. The Pepper Trees are invasive and near impossible to get rid of and the birds do their part to scatter the seeds across the landscape.
Yellow Rumped Warbler hovering up close and loud! A little chirp each time it arrives and takes off and the whirl of its rapidly flapping wings. While not able to sustain hovering like a hummingbird, the effort this warbler puts into eating with a certain style is truly admirable. This video is of just one lovely bird that found the suet feeder and would spend the entire day in the tree taking quick hover flights for a bite to eat. A slow motion video of the same bird set to the Blue Danube Waltz is at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rkpgP1WxaE8
A Yellow Rumped Warbler hovering in slow motion (120 fps) for over 9 minutes set to the Blue Danube Watlz. This is the same Warbler filmed close up in full HD at normal speed in : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WC0zdbgTyKA
Slow motion reveals the amazing ability of the Yellow Rumped Warbler to hover to feed from a suet feeder. For short bursts its wings beat almost as fast as a hummingbird and have an element of rotation to them reminiscent of a hummingbird. It also uses its tail feather to assist in movement back and forth and for stability. Hover time is most impressive between the 4 and 5 minute mark of the video. Very few small songbirds in the world can display this level of energy and athletic ability. These time lapses take place over a period of several hours. The Warbler triggered the motion detection software almost 100 times. Quite an extraordinary performance - set to the appropriate Blue Danube Waltz (courtesy of YouTube's Audio Library). I edited out the parts where the Warbler was sitting on the branch. In slow motion the sitting part took up most of the videos. The camera was triggered by motion so sometimes I got the whole trip to the feeder and sometimes just the beginning or end so I put together all the "action" parts over several hours.
A "Big Day" in the backyard! Winter birds are arriving now that the first really cold air is filtering down the eastern U.S.. The latest to arrive is a small group of 8-10 Yellow-Rumped Warblers and the first magnificent mature male Painted Bunting of the season. A few Bunting "Greenies" have been around for a week or so. A group of Catbirds are "meowing" in the brush - they do not come to the seed feeder. All-in-all things are pretty much on schedule.
