A Visit From the Hummingbird Moth

I guess I had heard of the hummingbird moth, but I never saw one until yesterday evening. I was talking with my mom on the phone; I was doing this on the back porch because the day had been so hot and the evening was, if not cool, at least cooler. This creature, this messenger appeared--I though it was a hummingbird at first, nosing into the petunias in the planters along the railing, but it moved too slow for a hummingbird, you could see the wingbeats even though they were still incredibly fast. I ran inside, still on the phone with Mom, and gestured to Darren to come outside and look.  He caught the urgency of my gesture and we were both able to watch the fellow dipping his feeding tube into our flowers--five six seven blooms, and then he lifted up and zoomed away into the deepening blue dusk over the rooftops. Son of a moth and an bird's illicit union?  Messenger from the realm of oncoming and ongoing dream? Fantastic, at any rate, in several senses of the word. I felt lucky to have been visited by this missionary.

Here's a borrowed video of what my visitor looked like.  Ours had different coloring but the general size and form were the same.