Another shot of a Peruvian Racket Tail while it is taking off from its perch.

BAM☺︎

Everyone loves Hummingbirds and for good reason, but I don’t think many people know how territorial they are and how mean they can be, especially around food sources. At bird feeders, there are often clashes of Hummingbirds as they fight for their food.

As my new best friend, Elias, and I were taking photographs of Hummingbirds at some feeders in Ecuador I mentioned to him that it would be cool to get a shot of the Hummingbirds clashing while in flight. He looked at me like I was crazy. I took that as a challenge and moments later I showed him this photo. He had nothing to say, but his silence was the best outcome.

These are both Peruvian Racket Tail. The one on the right is an adult male and the one on the left is a female. These Hummingbirds feature little booties above their feet. You can see that the female has little booties too but they are just not as defined as the male’s.

BAM☺︎

I hope that this photo is impressive because I’m very proud of it. This photograph is titled Long Tailed Sylph but only to keep my titles from being easy to distinguish and not too long. Credit should still be given to the Woodstar as well.

BAM☺︎

A female Green Honeycreeper sharing some food with a juvenile.

BAM☺︎

While the group I was with in Ecuador was busy photographing birds at some bird feeders, much of my attention was on a couple of Squirrels that were running around. I noticed one of them take this path along a moss covered branch that was on the ground. I positioned myself in a way that I could quickly capture the Squirrel running along that branch in case it chose that path again. Fortunately it did, and fortunately I did. I have a series of photographs while the Squirrel jumped along this branch and this might be the best one.

BAM☺︎

The Wire Crested Thorntail is a very small Hummingbird. This happens to be a male juvenile so the wire crest is still forming. The adult male has a crest that is fairly long protruding out of the back of its head and creates a really unique look. I only got to see an adult male for a brief moment and could not get a photo of it. Unfortunately it did not return to the feeders we were at. Maybe next time…

BAM☺︎

The Sicklebill has a specialty bill to access the inner parts of strange shaped flowers. This Buff Tailed Sicklebill was very elusive and we could only see it by crawling under some bushes to see where it perches.

BAM☺︎

Unfortunately this is the best shot I could get of a Giant Hummingbird. I say it’s unfortunate because I would have rather captured an image that truly shows the size of this Hummingbird. A better photograph would be of this Giant Hummingbird flying next to another Hummingbird for comparison. That opportunity did not work out this time so hopefully I will get to try again in the future.

This is still a pretty cool shot though.

The Giant Hummingbird is the largest of all Hummingbirds.

BAM☺︎

I saw quite a few Horses running around in the Páramo of Ecuador so I asked the driver of our photography group if they were wild. He replied that they are indeed wild. Later that night I decided to read a little more about the Horses. Turns out that they are wild, but technically they are feral. They were brought by the Spanish years ago and some escaped their captivity and now roam around the Páramo freely.

BAM☺︎