Day 19: firecracker plant

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BREAKING NEWS!

Dateline Knoxville: Red buckeye is in bloom on Chapman Ridge! It's time to get out your hummingbird feeders.

Ruby-throated hummingbirds (Archilochus colubris) migrate north into the eastern U.S. a little bit every day in the spring and they seem to follow the blooming of red buckeye, a.k.a. firecracker plant (Aesculus pavia) as the flowering progresses northward. 

Like redbud, red buckeye is a tall shrub or short tree, whichever you prefer. I do not have a dog in that fight. I don't have a dog.   

You are stuck inside. That is not news, you already know that, arg! But how much TV can you watch? Remember what the Canadian philosopher Marshall McLuhan said about television being a cold medium that requires little activity from your brain. It lulls you into a somnambulist state of mind. 

Hummingbirds are not zombies. They are vitality personified, full of life with active little brains and more stimulating to watch than yet another CSI. So much so that I dedicated an entire chapter to them in my third UT Press book: Ephemeral by Nature. 

What do you need to do? Mix some fresh sugar water: 4 parts hot water to one part sugar, hang your diner outside your favorite window and wait.

And, stay tuned to the Nature Calling newsroom for further updates. 

My favorite photo taken of me, or rather my thumb,
while I worked at Ijams Nature Center. Photo by Rex McDaniel

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