Are you ready for Orioles and Hummingbirds

Flowering plants, including flowering bushes and trees, will attract hummingbirds and orioles.
Enjoy the marvel of hummingbird flights when they arrive at your nectar feeder.
Orioles add lively action and dramatic colors to our yards and neighborhoods when attracted by a steady supply of grape jelly and sliced oranges.
One of our favorite times of the year is approaching: When our yard becomes a magnet for orioles and hummingbirds. These birds are dynamic species by species, and individual by individual, and their active behaviors and bright colors and feather patterns add much to our yards as soon as they arrive. Luckily, it’s relatively easy to attract these beautiful birds to your yard by providing some simple enticements, which can keep some birds coming back throughout the spring and summer!
Orioles and hummingbirds sometimes arrive the same day, often the same week, and they will begin to arrive in just a few weeks, depending on where you live. North of the sunbelt, we still have plenty of time to prepare for the first hummingbirds and orioles to arrive – the key is to have their preferred foods ready and waiting a week before they migrate into your area. Don’t wait until you see a hummingbird to put out your nectar feeder – check your records and get that sugar-water mixture available in your yard so your feeder is the preferred place to be. That goes for orioles too.
Like hummingbirds, even though there are a number of species found east, west and central, they all are attracted to the same foods. For orioles, oranges sliced in half provide the color and fruit that brings orioles to your feeding station pronto. But we have found that after the orange color attracts the orioles, they zero in on our offering of grape jelly, which is the food of kings among the orioles in our area – both Baltimore Orioles and Orchard Orioles.
There is a third food some orioles will utilize too: sugar-water nectar, just like the nectar mixture you make for hummingbirds. However, orioles usually need a bigger hole in the feeding ports to access the nectar; we always enlarge one of our hummingbird feeding ports a bit so an oriole can access the nectar. But we also add an oriole feeder to our feeding station, which has an orange-colored base to help attract orioles; not unlike the way the red-colored base of our hummingbird feeder attracts hummers.
The sugar to water mixture for hummingbirds and orioles is 1 part sugar to 4 parts water. Use regular ’ole white cane sugar – no substitutes, no way. This sucrose mix is similar to the sugar content of the nectar produced by flowers that hummingbirds and orioles favor. Which brings up the fact that in addition to attracting hummingbirds to your yard by providing sugar-water nectar in a feeder, they will also collect nectar from flower gardens and potted flowering plants. Hummers are most attracted to red tubular flowers, which produce the highest sugar content in their nectar, followed by pink, orange, and yellow flowers; so keep that in mind when selecting and planting flowers this spring.
Attracting and keeping them coming.
Attracting migrating orioles and hummingbirds to your yard benefits these birds with a staple food that helps them recharge as they prepare for the next leg of their migration. But in some cases, you can short-stop birds when they realize there is an ample and dependable food source and fresh water available, with nearby cover and nesting trees. That is pretty standard for many species, some birds will stay when all the essentials are provided, as long as your yard is within their nesting range. That has certainly been our experience year after year; while there may be a dozen Baltimore Orioles and half that number of Orchard Orioles using our feeding station at the peak migration, a few pairs always remain after others continue north. The same can be true for species of hummingbirds.
Your long-term goal should really be to attract the birds and hope they will spend the rest of spring and summer nesting and raising young through August or even into early September. But that means keeping your feeding station well stocked; refilling feeders before they are empty and keeping your feeders clean. As always, keep fresh water available for drinking and bathing too. That’s simple and the rewards are great: having these special birds in your company daily, but also knowing you are helping them during their critical nesting season when populations reproduce.
We think the arrival of hummingbirds and orioles in our yard each year is one of the biggest joys of birding, and the first week or so when there is a virtual parade of these colorful, fun to watch birds out your window is a period that’s hard to beat. Get ready for the arrival of orioles and hummingbirds in your yard.