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Anna's Hummingbird (Calypte anna) is a medium-sized hummingbird native to the west coast of North America. This bird was named after Anna Masséna, Duchess of Rivoli.
Anna's Hummingbird is 3.9 to 4.3 inches (10 to 11 centimeters)long. It has a bronze-green back, a pale grey chest and belly, and green flanks. Its bill is long, straight and slender. The adult male has an iridescent crimson-red crown and throat, and a dark, slightly forked tail. Anna's is the only North American hummingbird species with a red crown. Females and juveniles have a green crown, a grey throat with some red markings, a grey chest and belly, and a dark, rounded tail with white tips on the outer feathers.
These birds feed on nectar from flowers using a long extendable tongue. They also consume small insects caught in flight. A PBS documentary that first aired January 10, 2010, shows how Anna's Hummingbirds eat flying insects (at 16:45). They aim for the flying insect, then open their beaks very wide. That technique has a greater success rate than trying to aim the end of a long beak at the insect.
While collecting nectar, they also assist in plant pollination. This species sometimes consumes tree sap.
Anna's hummingbird. California.
Eriskay, from the Old Norse for "Eric's Isle", is an island and community council area of the Outer Hebrides in northern Scotland with a population of 143, as of the 2011 census. It lies between South Uist and Barra and is connected to South Uist by a causeway which was opened in 2001. (Bing)
Bodie Island Light
Outer Banks
Dare County, North Carolina
Bodie (pronounced like "body") Island Lighthouse, a few miles north of Oregon Inlet, is in the middle position among the three major lighthouses on North Carolina's Outer Banks; Currituck Beach is the farthest north, and Cape Hatteras is the most southerly. The Outer Banks Photography Workshop (Randall Sanger Photography & John Deas Photography) visited all three, beginning with this one on the first evening. The few clouds hugged the horizon and did not provide a remarkable display of color, but the warm sunlight and soft orange of the clouds nonetheless were nice. (Given the wind we had, mosquitos were surprisingly abundant.)
The lighthouse tower is the third at this site. The first (1848) was built on a poor foundation because of U.S. Treasury skimping and soon needed replacement. The second (1859) tower was a casualty of the American Civil War, blown up by Confederate troops to keep it from aiding the Union Navy. The current brick tower (built 1870-72, soon after Cape Hatteras light) is topped by a cast iron lantern room with a 1st-order Fresnel lens. Sources differ on some points, such as year the light was automated (1931 vs. 1954), height of lighthouse (150, 156, 163, and 165 feet); per www.outer-banks.com/lights/nbodie.cfm, it is 150 feet to the top of the tower, 165 feet to the top of the lantern room, and 156 feet the from ground to the focal plane. Bodie Island light is an active aid to navigation. The property was transferred from the Coast Guard to the National Park Service in 2000; the double keepers' house, built in 1893, is now a visitor center. Bodie Island Light Station was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 2003 (03000607).
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