Storybook Room #477 - Hummingbird

0:00Mmmmmhmmmmhmmhmmhmmmmmmhm Hey, do you know who I am? Oh sure we all do. Your humming gives you a way. Your hummingbird Rhyth, but the humming really comes from my buzzing wings All of the beautiful Ruby-throated hummingbird is back Hehehe, it's been here since I've chatted with you on 04. Mr. Corner Greek, be back It's super great to have you back, Ruby! Thanks, Million Uncle Bonnie Well, what are we gonna talk about today? Oh I'm the smallest bird in the world, you know it? Does that bother you, Annie, because you're so tiny? Oh, no way, Uncle Bob. I'm little, but mighty. And like how mighty? Oh, tough enough to drive a crow or a hawk or a eagle, Betty. No kidding. You mean you fight with these big dudes? Sure. Sometimes they come too close to my nest or feeding ground and I have to drive them away. You're a hundred times smaller than a hawk. How can you chase him away? Oh, my creator has made me fly very, very fast. Man, how fast is that? 60 miles an hour. Wow, it's a mile a minute. Yeah, and I have a very sharp two inch long bill that's just like a needle.

1:02How'd you like a 60 mile an hour needle flying at you? I get the point, Ruby. You're a tough kid. Plus, I can fly in any direction, sideways, up, down, backwards, forwards, and I can hover just like that. Just like a helicopter, and you can switch directions terribly fast, too. Yeah, that's what I do when the old crow drives to catch me, Uncle Bob. He can't go as fast as you and he kind of overshoots you. And meanwhile, I come up from behind and give him a sharp pick on the head. Hey, books out of my territory fast. I never knew such a tiny fellow like a hummingbird had so much spawn. Well, Uncle Bob, I only do that when my family or I am threatened. I'm really a nice guy to get along with. Well, that's good. Ruby, you were talking about your top speed of 60 miles an hour a minute ago. How rapidly do those little wings have to beat in their figure eight pattern to go that fast? Two hundred times a second. Two hundred times a second. That fast? Yeah, it's about the speed of mosquito wings. And your wings are actually humming them. That's how I got my name. Mrs. Hummingbird, sometimes I notice you when you're hovering like a helicopter at a flower.

2:03Your wings are really buzzing. Yeah, about 55 vibrations a second. And Ruby, while you're hovering about a foot above the ground, I notice the dry leaves on the ground are trembling like the wind is blowing. Right, I'm really stirring up a breeze. Your wings are different than any other birds, aren't they? Other birds can bend their wings at the so-called elbow and wrist bones, but I can't. Because you have no elbow and wrist bones, you just have one solid bone that's attached to your shoulder. Yes, imagine it this way, Uncle Bob. Like you had no elbow. Can't bend it, see. How would you move your arm? How'd I move my arm? Well, if I had no elbow, I'd move my arm from my shoulder joint. That's how I move my wings from my shoulders and my wings spin like the rotor blades of a helicopter. Hey, cool. That's why you can hover, go backwards, sideways, hopper down. Right on. If I want to fly forward, I pull my wings back and fly. Okay, how do you hover? When I see that yummy honeysuckle blossom, I position my wings in the middle of my body. Okay, and as you buzz them, that doesn't push you forward or backwards.

3:04It just makes you hover right there in the middle. Now, Ruby, when you want to back out of that blossom, what do you do? I position my wings forward, up near my head. Okay, so that's how your transmission works. Yeah, man, I have more than four on the floor too. More like six gears. My wing muscles are the heaviest part of me, Uncle Bob. Yes, I'd just say your wing muscles weigh one-third of your total body weight. Oh, yes, because that's where all my power comes from. You bet you. Ruby, how much do you weigh? You know how heavy a dime is? How heavy a dime? Oh, it's very, very light. That's me. The weight of a thin dime? A hummingbird? Now, here's something that'll blow your mind. Okay, dump it in here, Ruby. If you humans worked as hard as we hummingbirds, if you could fly like us, you would use up a thousand quarts of oxygen every hour, instead of your normal amount of sixteen quarts. Oh, you're energetic. So really, that makes us human sound kind of lazy compared to you, Ruby. Well, it may appear that way, Uncle Bob, but remember, we were meant to live this way. You weren't. You would burn up 450 times as much energy if you'd live like me.

4:05I don't think I care too. Being such an energetic little gal, you must have to have a tremendous amount of food to operate your two big wing muscles. Yeah, during the day, I eat continuously. I'll come to one of those sugar water feeders every twenty minutes in a summertime. Of course, I'll drink the nectar from flowers and eat some tiny bugs too. Good. Now, when you fly up to that feeder and just hover there, Ruby, all I can see is your bill going into that little glass spout to get a drink. How do you really drink? Tell me by. My creator did me two straws in my mouth, Uncle Bob. Actually, it's a long tongue with two hollow tubes. Like a double straw, and by the way, this straw is as long as your whole body. Right. The creator made it long so it can wiggle way down into the throat of that flower and get out the sweet goodies. Right on. I just hover there and turn on my pump. And I drain that little flower. Oh, God! So, sugar water or nectar is really your fuel. Yeah, it's a fuel that operates my two wing muscles. Now, if a human being ate as much sugar as you do, proportion to your size,

5:09how much sugar would we have to eat each day? 300 pounds of it. Oh, wow, 300 pounds of sugar a day. Wouldn't we be a fat mess? Some of your two-legged friends already are. We watched that, Ruby. You know, Uncle Bob, humans don't need anywhere near that amount of sugar. But hummingbirds need a tremendous amount. Or we won't be able to fly. We won't be able to stay alive. See, our body burns up that sugar-carbly thing. You betcha, your wing muscles need it. So it's okay for me to like sweets. They're not junk food for me. But they are for you, he's. What do you do at night, Ruby? The hummingbird sleeps at night. Okay, how do you stay alive? I mean, you said you need food continuously. What about at night? With great master engineer who made me put a special switch inside of me that lets me nearly turn off all of my energy system. You mean you don't burn much energy, very little energy, while you sleep? No, I don't. In fact, scientists have found that my body uses 93.5% less energy at night than during the daytime when I fly around.

6:11You use 93.5% less energy at night than during the daytime? Yeah, all because of this little switch that my maker put inside of me that helps me conserve energy. Boy, you must really turn your thermostat back at night. Now, your heartbeat and your body temperature must drop then, right? Oh, yeah, in fact, I act dead. Scientists have actually lifted me off my perch at night. I didn't move a muscle. Now, hummingbird, when you turn your thermostat back at night to save energy, how much does your body temperature drop? Welcome back during the day. My body temperature is about 100 degrees Fahrenheit, 38 Celsius. But at night, it goes down to the temperature of the air. If it's 40 degrees at night, my body temperature goes down to 40. That's a drop of 60 degrees. Oh boy, that's a super design to save energy and to keep you alive because you can't feed at night. Now, scientists call that being torped. T-O-R-P-I-D. It means something like hibernation. That's right. See, my old wife's creator knew I'd have to do this at night.

7:11I'd have to conserve energy. Or else, I'd die. It's all his truth. You'd run out of energy. But then, when the sun comes up the next morning, it warms you up. And does it turn your switch back on again? Right, my front beat picks up my body temperature rises and I fly off looking for fuel. Some nectar. But there's one thing I don't fully understand. Maybe my friends don't either, Ruby. You say at night you're almost dead. Your system has slowed way down. How do you even hang on the branch of that little bush? Well, my feet are really quite weak on top. See, when I land on my porch at night to go to sleep, my body weight pushes down on my feet. And that bends my legs naturally. Okay. As my legs bend, my back claw tightens. Around the branch. It locks there. It bites right into it. I see. And I can't fall off. And then next morning, I lift myself that straightens out my legs. And that loosens that back claw. It doesn't grab a hold of the branch anymore. So that explains how you can't fall off from the branch at night. You're locked on. The Lord Jesus Christ sure has a super plan for you, Ruby.

8:14Oh, Bob, maybe you'd like to know a few facts about a hummingbird's nest. Sure I would. Your nest is really tiny, isn't it? About the size of a walnut. Oh, that's small, that size of a walnut. What do you build it out of? Little pieces of bark held together by spider webs that I snitch. Is it true that you try to camouflage your nest? Yeah, I put moss on the branch and also around my nest. See, this way my nest doesn't stand out as something strange. The whole branch looks the same. So you decorate your nest with moss that's already on the branch. And it just looks like a little knot on the branch. How many eggs do you lay, Ruby? Two pearly white ones, and the size of a garden pea, or the size of a little pearl. Oh, this is great that something so tiny as you can do so many fantastic technical engineering things. Give the credit to my engineer, Uncle Bob, the great creator. Oh, we'll do that, Ruby. See, before you leave, would you please tell me about your migration? Oh, yeah, every autumn I leave for the warm South American continent. You fly across the ocean?

9:14Yeah, nonstop, provide 100 miles across the Gulf of Mexico. Wow, all in one tank of nectar? Sure, that's several thousand miles a gallon. Maybe you'd better talk with the EPA and the auto company engineers about that. It's time for me to go, Uncle Bob. I need another drink of nectar. Okay, there she goes, the Ruby-throated hummingbird. Job, chapter 12, verse 7 in the Bible, who talks about the way God provides for his creation. The verse says, ask the birds, they'll tell you. And you heard from one today, didn't you? The Ruby-throated hummingbird. Have you ever felt closer to God than you do right now? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I have. Sure, remember. Why don't you feel as close to him today? I don't know. I really don't know. I just don't feel as close to him, that's all. That's how I feel. Well, did he move or did you? I guess it's obvious I moved. He didn't know. Okay, since you moved away from him, how do you get close to him again like you once were?

10:18That's a good question. I don't know. I'm saved. I trusted Jesus Christ as my personal savior. I know I don't have to get saved all over again. I just need to get closer to him like I was a couple of months ago. That's just how I feel. Listen carefully to today's true Bible adventure. It'll show you how. Second King's chapter 6 tells us Celysha and his students were down near the Jordan River cutting down trees for a new building. And all of a sudden... Oh, what happened? Oh, the axe had slipped off and went in the river. Hey, man. You missed my head by a few inches, man. See, it'll pass me fast. Well, I'm sorry, guys. I was just chopping away. The thing just came loose and fell off. How proud of it. What are we going to do? The axe was borrowed. It's not ours. I guess we're going to have to find a way to get it all in the river. All right. What's this story about an axe head slipping off, man?

11:18You tell him, Jacob. Yes. Master Lysha, Nathan was just chopping away him. Mining his own business. The axe head slipped off the handle and fell in the river. And the worst part of it, sir. The axe was borrowed. It's not ours. Where would it flew off the handle? Where did it go? Where did it fall? Right over there, master. That deep spot of the river. All right, come on. Let's go over. The Bible tells us in 2nd King's chapter 6 that when Lysha was shown the place in the river where the axe head fell, he cut off a stick and threw it in the water. What did you do that for? Yeah. I just watched carefully now. Hey, hey, hey. His head is swimming to the top of the water. All right. Reach out and pick it up. All right. Here. I've got it. I've got it. Wow. Fantastic. When Lysha threw that stick in the water, it made the axe head float right up to it. Yeah.

12:18Gentlemen, it was the Lord who did it. Remember, if you ever lose anything, go back to the place where you lost it, because that's where the Lord's going to help you find it. Right here. Right here. Right here, sir. Okay. So have you lost any axe heads lately? What do you mean losing axe heads? Yeah. I don't even have an axe. Okay. What I meant was this, have you lost the sharp cutting edge to your life as a Christian? Are you chopping away with a handle? Oh, oh, oh. Yeah. I get it. No. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I have lost the sharp cutting edge to my life. I have to. It's as close to the Lord as I used to. Right. Okay. So you lost your axe head, your sharp cutting edge. What do you do when you lose something? Well, Lysha said in a story to go back where you lost it, and the Lord will help you find it. Right. Do you remember when you lost that close feeling to God? Hey. Yeah.

13:18Right. Do you remember now? Okay, tell me. Well, you see, about two months ago, I remember, I felt really close to the Lord. I mean, I had my axe head on, you know. Then I told a lie to my dad. I tried to cover up some things. And right then, I felt awful. I felt rotten. And I didn't feel close to my mom or dad. I didn't feel close to God, either. Okay. How do you get your axe head back on? Go back where I lost it. Go back to my dad. Say, Dad, I'm sorry. I sinned. I lied. And then you can talk to the Lord in prayer and ask him to forgive you, because you've already asked your dad see. Yeah. And then the Lord will give me my axe head back, my sharp cutting edge. Right. And you'll feel close to him again. Oh, that's a good feeling. Unconfessed sin in our lives as believers makes us feel far away from God. Are you chopping with just an axe handle?

14:19Hmm. Good question. Well, we're out of time. We'll be seeing you again for Storybook Room. Till then, Uncle Bob saying Cheerio.