Sometimes nature forces us to play favorites. Case in point: The hummingbird feeder taken over by a clever spider. Normally I don't get involved in wildlife border skirmishes. As my son has told me, I can't "play God." Best to let nature take it's course, right?
Wrong! When a crafty arachnid spins a food-gathering web from a splashy red feeder full of sweet-tasting "nectar" (as in the picture above--look real close to see his web and his curled up form beneath the feeder's "flower") he's got the fates slyly in his favor. I know it's his job. I also understand he needs to eat, just like the rest of us. Yeah, I guess he deserves to catch unwitting flies and hapless bugs. But hummingbirds weigh only 0.07 of an ounce. They could be trapped by the spider's nearly invisible web of death.
Sadly, there are many documented cases of this happening. And, I'm not gonna lie, I also hate it when one of my highly prized butterflies flits into the noxious network, suffering a slow, torturous demise. Most hummingbirds, however, know better than to get tangled in a spider's web, but when that web is so close to a coveted food source, I imagine it throws these tiny birds off their game a bit. It takes a lot of energy to keep those miniscule wings spinning--they flap them up to 80 times per second--so they are constantly seeking carbs to keep them charged. Get them close to a whole feeder full of food and I think they throw caution to the wind. Kinda like hazarding a stretch of desert in order to make it to the oasis.
I wasn't taking any chances. As gently as I could, I dislodged the top portion of the web and tried to anchor it on the porch post, but I think I ticked off the spider when a day or two passed and his mutilated web didn't catch a darn thing. I imagine he huffed off in disgust because when I checked this morning, he'd moved on. Sorry buddy. I'm the god of this garden.
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