A small hummingbird’s wings can flap up to 80 times per second, and they have the unique ability to fly in any direction – even backwards.

This usually means that by the time I frame my shot and focus properly, the little sucker has already moved, leaving me to fumble with my camera trying to re-frame and re-focus.

It’s also quite fidgety, not unlike a little kid who really, really, really needs to go to the bathroom. As in, right now.

That kind of fast-paced wing-beating is very taxing on a bird with such a tiny body, and so the hummingbird spends very little of its day actually flying and feeding. Which means there is a small window of opportunity to catch this fascinating creature in action.

After failing to photograph it after a couple of days, I finally sat myself down on my sister-in-law’s couch, trained my camera out the backyard garden, and waited. It took me about forty minutes of sitting quietly and patiently, constantly re-framing and re-focusing. But in the end, I managed to get her as she fed on a kangaroo paw flower.

Or maybe it’s a him. I wouldn’t put it past a guy to keep a girl waiting like that.