Birds, Bugs

The Curious Overgrown Flying Bug Thing

This thing flew into the garden today
What it happens to be, I really can’t say
If a bird, it’s absurd
If a bug it’s a thug
I didn’t quite know when it flew on away.     

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But I captured it here in a camera shot
To ponder this thing with a little more thought    
It’s snout it sticks out
It’s legs are like pegs
A BUG, I find myself thinking a lot.         

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Oh No! Oh Heck! Please help, my dear
This is the scariest guest of the year
A bee times three
Scares the pee out of me
Now we must all move away from here. 

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But when I look close, my heart it may ring
For on its big butt, is nary a sting
A friend, I pretend
My pal, somehow
The curious overgrown flying bug thing.

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53 thoughts on “The Curious Overgrown Flying Bug Thing”

  2. Hah! A hummingbird moth! We called it the hummingbug. It really does fly like a hummingbird. We thought it might be a baby hummingbird but it is clearly a bug on freeze frame inspection. Thanks! I hoped someone would let me know what it really is. The curious overgrown flying bug thing! 🙂

  4. Whew! I’m so glad it is a moth. I feared there might be a mega stinger lurking in there somewhere. As I note on the previous comment, we called it the hummingbug as it really does fly like a hummer. Good fun. Thanks. 🙂

    1. You mean the tomato hornworm grows into this thing? Hmmm. Well, we have tomatoes and they are still there as of now. And I guess, as it has already turned into the moth, clearly enticed by the phlox flower we might be safe. Now if only the tomatoes would get on with turning red. This cool summer is lovely for ambient weather but does not encourage the tomatoes to do what they do best. Cheers. 🙂

    1. Oh great! I’m glad you liked it. It was really fun to write. Thank you so much for letting me know that you liked it. 🙂

    1. It does rather look like a mutant. Boy-howdy, does it ever look like a hummingbird in flight. But clearly a bug. Turns out, as noted in the above comments, it is a hummingbird moth. We called it the hummingbug. Not far off, eh?

    1. Glad it piqued your curiosity. Mine too. Of course, I could have typed ‘bug that flies like a hummingbird’ into Google, but it is ever so much more fun and engaging to put it out there and have a little rhyming fun. Have a great day. 🙂

    1. I had never seen it before either. You should see it fly – very hummingbird like. Wings up high, buzzing like crazy while it hovers over the plant. Too cool. 🙂

  12. Good pics 🙂 The strange thing in your garden made me want to know more. I checked the above link and some other hummingbird moth sites. I found out it does not occur in this part of the world (Northern Europe, Finland) where I live.

    1. Shucks. I guess you won’t see this strange overgrown flying bug thing fly into your garden. I had never seen one before, that I recall, and I fancy myself a reasonably observant fellow who spends a lot of time in the garden. They are either rare or just don’t frequent our gardens, though it clearly preferred the phlox blossom and we have had a lot of phlox growing for a long time. Hence, I have had a food which this bug likes growing in abundance for years and this was the first time I witnessed its presence. But what a presence it is. It really does fly like a hummingbird. Thanks for checking on its range and thanks for sharing. Have a great day. 🙂

  13. I am insanely jealous of your hummingbird moth photos! My daughter snapped a photo two years ago of a “hummingbird with antennae” but it was very blurry and I haven’t seen one since. Incidentally, our moth was also dining on phlox nectar.

    1. I wasn’t sure how the pictures would come out, as it was ‘flapping’ it’s wings so incredibly rapidly, but they did come out. Well, the four I showed came out. Several others were blurry. And yes, it dined exclusively on the phlox in the few minutes it was in our garden. The website that wabi sabi shared mentions that it is a moth who comes out in the bright sunshine, which was the precise conditions when it was here. Most interesting. Cheers! 🙂

  16. Amazing! I had never heard of a hummingbird moth before but now I am on the lookout for one. Wait. . . I wonder if they live in Indiana . . . time to look into that question. Great job on the pictures, by the way. 🙂

    1. Oh yes! They may be found in Indiana. This one was in Indiana. Jim’s Garden is Hoosier all the way through. (West Central Indiana, that is.) 🙂

  17. Yes, I love the hummingbird moths that visit the garden here; haven’t seen one yet this year. It is a little startling the first time you see one, which your verses captured perfectly!

    1. A little startling. Yep. Really pretty, though and quite the flyer. Well, really more of a hoverer. Thanks for the kind compliment on the verses. Have a wonderful day! 🙂

    1. I hope that is a good thing. Have a wonderful day and thanks for reading. Good luck with that garlic braiding. 🙂

    1. Quite different, yes. I had never seen one before, as I express in the post. I guess they are rare here but folks in other regions seem more familiar with them.

    1. Great. Thanks Lorrie. You might just have been ducking for cover the first time you saw it. For a bug, it is HUGE!

  23. I LOLd. Hummingbird clearwings are super cool. One flew right past my face the other day but I couldn’t keep up with it to get a picture so good job! I almost peed, too but from excitement, not fear. They don’t make the tomato hornworms, those moths are even bigger!

    1. They are cool. Not common here, evidently. For the record, the post does not specifically state whether I peed my pants or not. Implies, perhaps, but we must leave a few things to the imagination. 🙂

  24. When living in Spain i had frequent visits of the curious creatures. At first i also thought is was a hummingbird but this one is smaller. It acts as a hummingbird though. I know it as a hummingbird butterfly. It comes in different sizes and colors (reddish, greenish and greyish i had in my garden)
    They loved appleblossom nectar..

    1. Very interesting. So I guess you became accustomed to their presence. Our ‘hummingbug’ (as we call it) has been back a few times now. The other day it flew in under the umbrella while we were eating dinner and did its buzzy fly trick as it dined on the bouquet in the middle of the table. The Bug Who Came to Dinner. 🙂

      1. I have seen several of them, I just never got the chance to take a picture of them.
        In the afternoon while sitting on the terras you could hear them humming 😉

  25. i have heard of hummingbird moths, but never had the good fortune of seeing one up close and personal. Beautiful!

    1. They are remarkable. I had not actually heard of such a thing until it came buzzing through the garden. I really thought it was a baby hummingbird at first. The pictures proved otherwise. Now it has been back a couple of times. Pretty cool. Thanks for checking in. 🙂

  26. The first time I saw hummingbird moths at the Chicago Botanic Garden, I didn’t know what they were either. Pretty but a bit weird:) I like them.

    1. Pretty weird, but I like them too. And I’m much comforted that it is a moth, especially as it has been buzzing our dinner table. 🙂

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