Our New Friend Harold

Last week I decided to use $10 of our grocery money to splurge and buy ourselves a hummingbird feeder. I've seen hummingbirds coming around by our balcony and thought it would be an educational investment. Within a few days we had our first hummingbird, and he comes around everyday now, many times throughout the day, especially in the morning. So this morning, I held Paulo on my lap and we were super quiet and still. Hunter got out his Nikon camera and shot a whole bunch of photos, and these turned out the best.

Yes, we really took these photos. They're not from an online stock photography company. The photos look a little different from each other because Hunter used flash on the second one.

Anyway, we named him Harold. We confirmed he's a ruby throated hummingbird. He seems to be protective of his new found territory--we watched him bully off another hummingbird who had come to check out the new feeder. It's kind of cool being able to bring nature so close to our home. Paulo gets really excited about it. Beautiful eh?

We also observed another cool natural phenomenon yesterday afternoon. After returning home from church, we got out of the car, and Paulo always sits on this little spot on the curb next to a fence while waiting for us to get Andre and all our bags. Well, on this particular occasion, there was a highway system of tiny ants along the bottom of this curb, which stretched from a little tiny hole in the cement (by our car) about 30 feet along the walkway toward the mailboxes. The ants were rushing in two different directions, and in a perfect line. And the funny part is that at one point along the "highway" the ants broke off the normal path and started up the curb in a diagonal line, and it looked just as if it was a highway exit. It was so cool. Hunter told me that the reason the ants stayed in a perfect line like that is because the ants, which are all female, communicate with each other through pheromones and their antennae. Isn't that cool?