Guy Obsessed With a Hummingbird Tries Bizarre Tricks to Make It Land on Him — on Day 15, It Happened

Love knows no boundaries. When it erupts, it erupts, irrespective of whether the two lovers are humans or not. In the case of Joe Ballantyne (@joeyyikes), the lover was a hummingbird. It started in the fall of 2022. One eye contact, and Ballantyne’s world changed forever. A jewel-throated iridescent hummingbird stopped by in his garden to drink nectar from a bird feeder. The moment his eyes clapped with the eyes of the bird, Ballantyne was enchanted with a longing so deep that he stretched his palm to hold his feathery visitor he named “Hummus.” But the more he tried, the farther the hummingbird moved from him.

Over the next few days, Ballantyne attempted the most bizarre tactics to make the bird come closer to him. It wasn’t until the 15th day that the hummingbird finally paid attention and allowed him to touch it. Ballantyne’s unusual journey illustrates why we should never give up. He documented the entire journey in a series of TikTok videos, which have been watched and liked by millions of people.

“Trying to get this hummingbird to land on my hand,” Ballantyne wrote in the caption of the Day 1 video. The video showed him sitting down in front of a crystalline red feeder dangling from a hook mounted in a garden bush. Hummus was slurping nectar from one of the feeding ports. Holding a cup of sugar water, Ballantyne extended his hands, but the bird didn’t pay a heed. It just kept shifting from one port to the other, finally flying away.

On Day 2, Ballantyne repeated the same posture. But this time too, the feathery guest explored the feeder, sipped some nectar, and fluttered away. “And back to the tree he goes,” the birder lamented. The next episode was just as disappointing. Sudden arrival of a huge hornet jolted the feeder into a swinging motion that spilled the nectar onto the grassy bed, inviting bugs that crawled to Ballantyne’s naked feet and started biting.

On Day 3, he tried a different approach: sprinkling some frozen red flowers in the cup of sugar water. But sadly, Hummus wasn’t interested.“They were shy today,” he said. On Day 4, the birder pulled out another trick from his list to attract the bird. Call it bad luck, but the bird didn’t even come near him. It kept flapping its wings in the air and went away. “You watch them fly by. They look at you, then fly away,” he grumbled and clenched his fists, exclaiming “Arghhh!”

Day 5 brought with it a grain of hope, but not success. Undeterred, Ballantyne came up with yet another strategy. On Day 6, he sat down on the deck wearing a red T-shirt. With a palm tucked on his cheek, his dispirited face longingly gazed at the feeder. The other palm was filled with seeds and stretched forward. This time, too, he failed.  

Upon suggestions from his viewer comrades, on Day 7, he adopted a strategy unlike anything ever seen before. He took down the bird feeder and became the feeder himself. He tried a ghillie suit, donned a hilarious-looking red Superman costume, sunglasses studded with red feeding cups, and even smothered his face in red paint.

It was finally on Day 15 when his rigorous, painstaking practice bore fruit. Hummus swooped down on a feeding port attached to his face and sipped nectar while Ballantyne embraced it. “It just keeps getting better. Closer and closer,” the birder exclaimed, a smile lit up on his face. He watched the hummingbird disappear into the autumn mist, awaiting the next spring when it would return from the South and visit his garden.

Watch the Day 15 video here:

You can follow Joe Ballantyne (@joeyyikes) on TikTok to watch the entire hummingbird-chasing video series. 

More on Green Matters

New Yorker Sets up Angled Mirror Underneath the Feeder — and Records Hummingbird Activity for Hours

Man Creates the World’s Largest Bird Feeder That Can Accommodate 108 Birds and 1500 Lbs of Grains

Man Offers Water to a Thirsty Pigeon That Visited His Yard — Now the Bird Is Obsessed With Him