Anna’s Hummingbird with Winter Bud

Male Anna’s hummingbird

I’m taking a year-long course called Phlorography Online 2022 where many teachers share techniques for expanding the student’s photographic repertoire. For my hummingbird photograph above I practised creating a hand-painted background digitally and finished the image with a slight canvas texture.

Anna’s hummingbirds spend the winter on the west coast of British Columbia, Canada, where it is normally fairly temperate. However, as I have posted before, this past winter we got major snowstorms and below freezing temperatures for weeks at a time. The hummingbirds stayed close to the feeders, puffed up, trying to stay warm. This particular male hummingbird liked to shelter under the snow-laden branches of our honeysuckle bush, then would often be more exposed when the weather warmed a little.

We aren’t seeing the hummingbirds as often as spring draws near; I’ve read that Anna’s hummers begin nesting in late January, believe it or not.

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