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Did I mention how much I love Humming birds? Well I do!! I love their antics, ability to hover, their wonderful colors and oh yes their attitudes!

And this past weekend I had the chance to go to Humming bird lover's heaven at the Arizona Sonora Desert museum hummingbird aviary.

I walked in and right away this little Hummingbird was more then willing to pose and so cute just sitting there on the branch until I lined up just the capture I wanted with the tree branch and light behind. In fact he was so close I could have reached out and touched him!

Something you may not know about humming birds

Hummingbirds use spider webbing as a way to bind and tie their nests together. Without that component the nests are very fragile and will fall apart.

Here's what Karen Krebbs from the Desert Museum had to say:

Hummingbird Aviary Background by Karen Krebbs
When we first opened the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum's hummingbird aviary, we had no idea whether or not any of the seven species of the birds on exhibit would breed and rear young. Since opening day, however, we've seen Costas, Broad-billed, Black-chinned, Anna's, and Calliope hummingbirds nest, lay eggs, and rear young. There have been a total of 114 nests built, 186 eggs laid, 116 birds hatched, and 102 birds fledged. No other zoological institution can boast of such success!
But this success has not come without a good deal of effort on the part of the exhibit keepers and the hummingbirds - especially when it comes to nest-building. For example, in 1992 we renovated the exhibit, clearing out all the plants and expanding and replanting the new space. Within a month of the renovation, several hummingbirds began to build nests.
The nests were loose and quite fragile, and even experienced nesters were having difficulty. Most of the nests fell apart and we lost several eggs that fell out and broke. We scratched our heads for days trying to figure out the problem before we finally concluded that a primary component of hummingbird nests was missing spider webs!
Hummingbirds use spider webbing as a way to bind and tie their nests together. The spiders had yet to reestablish themselves in the spanking new exhibit. I immediately went out and collected webs from around the grounds, rolling them up on twigs, which I left in the aviary. I also collected 25 labyrinth spiders and introduced them. Within days the spiders were weaving their webs in the aviary and the birds' nests immediately improved.
Photo info:

No Photoshop here this one is cropped about 50% in Canon Digital Photo Professional then exported as a JPEG.

I took this capture with a Canon EOS 5D Mark II camera and Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM lens.

Exposure: 0.003 sec (1/400)
Aperture: f/5.6
Focal Length: 400 mm
ISO Speed: 1000
Exposure Bias: 0 EV
Flash: Off, Did not fire

I captured this shot of a Phoenix Light Rail train as it went by early this morning during sunrise. The yellow and red colors are the rays of the morning sun reflecting off office building windows.

No Photoshop and no post editing other then sharpening and color boost this is right out of the camera. Raw image proccessed in Canon Digital Photo Professional to JPEG.

Its amazing how far in a slow shutter speed panning shot you can push the Canon 100-400 Zoom and still get a sharp photo of the moving train, I found 1/10th of a second to be about the limit.

This shot would not have been possible without the high ISO capability of my Canon EOS 5D Mark II camera and incredible stabilization of my Canon EF 100-400mm f/4.5-5.6L IS USM lens.

Thanks for all your kind comments and favs everyone!

Exposure: 0.1 sec (1/10)
Aperture: f/5.0
Focal Length: 100 mm
ISO Speed: 1600