Hummingbird Festival

     For a few years now, Ben has heard on the radio about the Hummingbird Festival in Holly Springs, Mississippi.  It always sounded like a neat thing to go to, and with the girls a bit older now, we decided to go.  We also invited Hannah and Ragan to go with us.  After eating at Shoney's in Greenwood, we headed to the festival.  The festival was extremely educational with live animal shows, hummingbird viewing and banding, nature trails, wagon rides and a kid's nature tent. 

 "Good Ole, Down-home Mississippi Snakes

Terry Vandeventer, Herptologist

The first thing we did was see the live animal show called "Good Ole, Down-home Mississippi Snakes." It was so informative. We learned that there are no snake bite deaths ever recorded in the state of Mississippi, but a snake bite would probably put you in the hospital for a couple of days. He showed us about 6 different snakes that you would find in Mississippi.

The Kids' Nature Activity Tent was pretty neat.  They had all kinds of hands on activities for the kids to do.  All the girls got their face painted too!  Well... Ella got her hand painted.  =)

 

 "Exotic and Invasive Animals"

Bob Tarter

The next live animal show we saw was "Exotic and Invasive Animals."  He showed some birds, some snakes, an armadillo and more! Lots of really neat facts were shared about each of these animals.

Watch out Hannah!

    This part of the festival was by far the coolest.  The Hummingbird Banding Tent is where they measured, weighed, checked the fat, and banded the hummingbirds.  The hummingbirds are banded so that they their migration can be tracked for research purposes.  There are places all over the country and South America that capture and band the hummingbirds.  It is painless, harmless and doesn't bother the birds one bit to have the tiny, almost weightless, band on their leg.  Hannah and I got to hear the heartbeat of one of the birds.  Their hearts beat 1,200 times a minute.  It sounded like a little vibration in its chest.  Hannah also was allowed to hold a hummingbird and release it back into nature.  The hummingbird just sat in her hand after the lady let go of it for a few seconds, before the lady bumped Hannah's hand to urge it to fly away.   

The hummingbirds waiting their turn.

 

 Getting measured

 The band on its leg

 The hummingbird on the left is the one that Hannah held.  The workers said that the bird had a lot of molt, the most they've ever seen.

We had a great lunch... cheeseburger, chips, cookies and a drink... I had barbecue nachos... then later we treated ourselves to snow cones from this cute snow cone trailer.  Yummy!

   There was a two story, beautiful house in the middle of the grounds called Davis House.  When you walked to the back of the house, there was a room full of windows looking out over a garden.  There were several hummingbird feeders and traps for us to view the hummingbirds in action.  Never saw so many in my life. 

 On top of all the educational things going on, there was also arts and crafts vendors.  Some very unique, creative things... especially Biggy Piggy (which carried felt stuffed animals) and this cool praying mantis water hose holder.

It really was a wonderful day for all.  We finished it off by eating at Cracker Barrel in Batesville.  Couldn't have asked for better weather or better behavior! We even saw a beautiful rainbow on our way home!