It's A Hummer! A Bumble Bee? No! A SPHINX MOTH!

As an added attraction for hummingbirds, I couldn't resist hanging a small feeder at the arch of the arbor so we could see it better. It only holds one cup of nectar so we've been filling it up quite often these days. My hubby placed a small screw on the arch of the arbor, then cut a chain just long enough so the feeder wouldn't be a "head-banger" for anyone. I then taped a large bright red Christmas bow to the bottom of the feeder -- just for fun. Best of all, the feeder is in plain view of any thirsty hummers that come zooming by so they can easily spot it. AND, our small efforts paid off! Just for the record -- a gorgeous little hummer perched at the edge of this little feeder today and sipped for the longest time. What a delight he was to watch!

Back to my stroll in the garden a few weeks ago . . . .

Dusk was slowly chasing the daylight hours away now, but it was still light enough to see the flower beds -- especially the tall buddleias. While glancing in that direction from the patio, I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw what I believed was a baby hummingbird whirring its little wings and sipping nectar from the buddleia blossoms. It was flitting from blossom to blossom, hungrily sipping nectar with what I THOUGHT was its beak. I quickly called my husband to come and see our baby hummer, and to be careful not to frighten it away.

Together, we slowly moved closer and closer to the buddleia blossom, wishing we had our camera in hand. Suddenly, I noticed something very odd. THIS hummer didn't have a long, needle-like beak at all -- at least not like all the other hummingbirds we've seen! In fact -- this wasn't even a HUMMINGBIRD!

After peering at this beautiful, albeit odd looking "insect" for some time, we ruled out the possibility of it being a HUGE bumblebee. Finally, after an almost nose-to-nose inspection, I saw that this little visitor had two long antennae AND a very long proboscis that it used for drinking nectar!

Although it was almost fully dark outside by now -- the light slowly began to dawn (in my head). We had just been blessed with the visit of our very first SPHINX MOTH! Since that pleasant evening in late July,

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