March 30- May 4

More and different photos at Ophardtphotos.com

Our household has been treated with an extraordinary experience for the last six weeks.  On March 30, I discovered that a humming bird was building a nest on a hanging cactus within 10 feet of our front door and office window.  The photos may make the nest look large, but it is really about 2 inches in diameter and the same in depth.  If you make a circle with your thumb and first finger, that is the size of the nest.  The nest was perfectly positioned with no obstructions to make the photography a real joy from having the front door about a third open, camera on a tripod and a 300 mm lens.  Most of the time I used ambient light and a few times with flash. A few photos such as the eggs (less then the size of an M&M) and the baby birds in the nest were taken with an iPhone with flash about 6 inches away.  In the final week, I must have spent several hours each day taking photos.  The female bird was very meticulous in feeding each baby equally about every half hour.  It was amazing to see the development of the birds and feathers in just 8 days when most of the photos were taken.  This morning one baby flew off to a nearby small tree and was still there at the end of a very windy day.  The other baby is still in the nest as I am writing this.

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