Hummingbird in the Ocotillo

There's a large Ocotillo across from the Visitor's Center at Caballo Lake State Park.  I was waiting for the office to open again after lunch and was walking around looking at the flowers.  I looked up and saw this Black-chinned Hummingbird feeding from the bright red flowers.  I must have taken 100 photos and when the office door opened again for business, I could hardly straighten my neck. 

I was standing at the base of this large Ocotillo and wanted to get a shot looking up:

Then I took another photo and noticed this tiny bird near the top:

See him on the right side, about halfway down?   I zoomed in on him and took all the photos.  Lots of tummy shots from this angle - see how his tiny feet and legs are tucked up out of sight?  Fun, fun, fun! 

I told the Volunteer in the office about all the photos I got and he said one day that bird was caught in the office when he went to lunch.  It must have come in the open door and wasn't noticed when people left.  As soon as the Volunteer came back and opened a window, the hummingbird flew out and went right to "his" tree.  I guess he guards it and keeps the other hummers away.  I wonder if he was peeking out the window watching his rivals stealing all his nectar.

That's all for today.  I haven't seen many hummingbirds lately and wanted to post the best shots I got of this Black-chinned little guy.

After posting all the cactus flowers in the last post, I remembered a large cactus on the side of my San Diego condo - it was a while before I even realized it was there.  Then one day I noticed it was blooming - I think these were the first cactus blooms I'd ever seen.  It funny that I thought this was a very large cactus - little did I know when I took these photos that I'd see many, many HUGE cactus plants in the near future.  :)

I think it's interesting that cactus plants have two different color blooms on the same "leaf."  

From me and Katie, have a great Sunday, everyone!  :)

PS - I've been getting a lot of spam e-mails from people - at this point it's pretty easy to figure out they are spam and I just delete them.  Now I'm noticing a lot of "Delivery Notification - Failure" messages in MY spam folder telling me that some messages that "I" sent didn't' make it to the recipients.  Just a reminder that these spam e-mails are in the rise, and if you get one from me that doesn't look right, please just delete it. You can e-mail me at sm92078@aol.com if you are unsure.