“The swimming pool and play ground area in my condo have many flowering plants. These offer plenty of opportunities to observe sunbirds which come to enjoy the nectar. The edited video shows a female Olive-backed Sunbird (Nectarinia jugularis) sips nectar of the Heliconia psittacorum ‘Lady Di’. This is one of the most popular Heliconia cultivars in Singapore.
“The video clip was recorded on 8th Jan 2013 with the 100 fps high speed feature of my new Lumix FZ200. On playback @ 25 fps, it becomes a quarter speed slow motion video. The action of the bird inserting its bill through the opening in the flower could be seen very clearly. With high speed recording, there was no audio track. What I have done was to dub an audio clip of Black-naped Orioles in their courtship songs in the video.
“Above is another video, recorded on 29th Dec 2012 at normal speed, showing a female sipping nectar of the ‘Lady Di’. Can’t tell if this was the same bird as the one shown in the video above.”
Sun Chong Hong
Singapore
5th April 2013