Attracting Hummingbirds to your yard is easy and practically guaranteed!

Where ever you live in the USA there’s at least one species of hummingbird that will make your yard more interesting.    If you live in the Southwest you will get the lion’s share.

I feel that hummingbirds are the single most interesting bird to attract to your yard.  They are beautiful, their flight patterns are unique, and they make very unusual sounds which announce their presence.

They make a squeaky, chittery noise that sounds more like mice than birds as they perch and fly.  Their wings make noise, too, somewhat like a small industrial sewing machine.  During their courtship routine, they make a vrooming noise, somewhat like a child mimicking the sound of a jet airplane.  If God had given them the gift of song, they would be perfect!

Their behavior is aggressive, consistent and predictable.

Hummingbirds follow the food.  Wherever there’s an inviting supply of nectar flowers, the birds will be buzzing.  As nectar feeders gained in popularity in recent years, the hummers have shifted their migration patterns and species have begun to show up in new territories.  By keeping feeders available during the winter and early spring, you might keep them year round!  Go to Garden Accent Heaven for the best priced, highest quality, and greatest variety of hummingbird feeders.

Fall and winter are perfect times to plan the longest growing season of hummingbird plant magnets.  High nectar content is the first principle, and then choose red-orange, red, and orange flowers that are a tubular shaped.  Bees will also be attracted to many of the same type flowers.  Read on for some helpful hints.

Hummers also eat tiny insects and spiders.  They use the spider webs to make their nests so it is good to have webs about your yard for them to gather.

Providing water for them is highly recommended.  Spend the amount needed to purchase a bird bath with a mister just for your hummers. (Link to our site) They love the fine spray.  You can even add a timer and the hummers will learn the time settings and be waiting for their bath! And you will know when  the show will begin!

Now let’s talk about which plants to put in your yard.  Choose tubular shaped flowers, those with a flaring rim above a long tube that attaches to the stem.  Tubular flowers are inaccessible to other pollinators so that the hummers are assured of a reward when they visit them.  Example:  daisy type flowers have high nectar but all insects can get to them.  Some bees will get in to some of the tubular but the hummers and bees have a pretty good team approach .

You will want to plant perennials, annuals, vines, shrubs and small trees thus providing the widest range of choices and the longest growing season.   Following are the most common plants that will grow in most areas of the USA.  With a bit more effort on your winter reading, you will find more plants specific to your region.

Click here to see an excellent PPS special Hummingbirds: Magic in the Air.

Western Columbine

Columbines (Aguilegia spp) are a great plant to grow for their intricately shaped flowers, good color ranges, frilly fern like leaves, and some have a long bloom period.  They are perennial and will reseed easily.  Columbines rely on hummingbirds to pollinate them so there is a good symbiotic relationship.

The nectar is secreted in the long tube of the flower and collects in a bulge at the base, making it the ideal source for humming birds.  Plant them en masse for extra effect along walk ways and patios.

You can find them in seed catalogs and as plants at high quality nurseries in the early spring.  I like to get starts and seeds from friends.

There are seed catalogs that focus on native plants which contribute to their hardiness and accessibility by hummers.   Four to experiment with are:

1. Aquilegia Canadensis, Canada or wild red columbine.  Native from Manitoba and Saskatchewan to Ontario and
   

   Canada Columbine

   Quebec south through much of the eastern United States.  The flowers are red and lemon yellow in midspring to midsummer.  Plants grow two feet tall and one foot wide.  Wild red columbine is also a larval food plant for the columbine dusky wing butterfly.

2. 

   Rocky Mtn Cloumbine

   Aquilegia carulea, Rocky Mountain columbine. Erect blooms are bicolor in lovely shades of blue and white.  Plants grow 1 to 2 feet tall and bloom from June to August.  This is the state flower for Colorado and includes the mountains of southwestern Montana and central Idaho to northern New Mexico and Arizona.

3. Aguilegia chrysantha or golden or yellow columbine. The horizontal-facing canary
   

   Yellow Columbine

   yellow flowers look like little rockets.   They have a long bloom from April to September making them especially appealing.  Plants grow 2 to 3 feet tall with a nearly equal spread.  They grow in mountain canyon seeps in the Sonoran and Chihuahuan desert regions, and are found from west Texas, southern New Mexico, southern Utah, and Arizona and Mexico.

4. 

   Western Columbine

   4. Aquilegia Formosa, western columbine.  Formosa means beautiful.  It reaches 1 ½ feet tall and bears dangling yellow and red blooms in late spring through early summer.  The spurs are only about ½ to ¾ inch long and point upright, making them ideal for hungry hummers.  They are found in meadows and damp areas of western mountains, the Pacific Northwest, and Alaska.

5. Aquilegia longissima, Long Spur Columbine, relies on the sphinx moths with their
   

   Long Spur Columbine

   extra long proboscises to effect pollination; hummer tongues are too short for them to successfully feed on this plant.  This species has particularly large flowers with spurs that are 4 to 6 inches long which makes them inaccessible to hummers.   They are native from west Texas to southern Arizona and northeastern Mexico.

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Hummers and Orioles are on the way. Hummingbirds arrive during March and April as they return from their winter migration.

Dr JB's Easy Clean Feeder

This is a great time to get out your hummingbird feeder and to get ready for their return. Be sure to check out our new Dr. JB’s Easy Cleaning Feeder, the best hummingbird feeder ever made! Solid and durable construction and easy to fill and clean.

Fliteline Jelly Feeder

Colorful Orioles begin arriving in April, so plan to get your out then. We have a great new product, BirdBerry   Jelly, that you can use in our Songbird Essentials Fliteline Jelly Jam Feeder. Over the counter jelly is very high in sugar content, so the lower sugar and higher fruit content of BirdBerry Jelly more closely matches their natural food sources. The unique grape/blackberry flavor keeps Orioles and other birds (like Catbirds and Woodpeckers) coming back for more.

BirdBerry Jelly