Hummingbirds: It's a Small Small World

Of the thousands of species of birds, the hummingbird is one of the most curious. Not for them the seeded bird feeder. Hummingbirds are on a separate plane of existence.

"Hummers" as their fans call them, are all of about three and a half inches long and on average, weigh an amazing one-eighth of an ounce! Typical body temperature is about 107° F and heart rate ranges from 250 beats per minute resting to an awesome 1200 beats per minute flying! If you think that is an incredible rate, their wings beat at 55 per second! Their eggs range in size from that of a pea to a lima bean! It is truly a small, small world!

There are seventeen varieties of Hummingbirds in North America, but only two can be found around this area, the common Ruby Throated Hummingbird and the Rufous Hummingbird. The Rufous variety is often called "feisty" and can even be pushy when it comes to competing with other "hummers" at the feeder. Rufous look quite different from the Ruby Throated. The Rufous males have a bright orange-red area around their necks and throats with a white breast. The female Rufous lacks the orange-red area but their backs are green and they also have a white breast. The Rufous hummers have the longest winter migrations, to Mexico and Panama. Indeed it is hard to imagine such a tiny creature going so far!

The Ruby Throated variety is the most common and seemingly everyone's "stereotype" hummer, or rather the male is. The bird has an emerald green back and the male has the beautiful ruby coloured throat. The female has a white throat and breast.

Hummingbirds do not eat seeds like other birds, but rather dine on nectar from flowers, or sugar water from bird feeders made specially for them. One might wonder how nourishing a diet sugar water could be, but in these birds' case, it's just what they need. Hummingbirds need to eat three times their weight per day because their metabolism is so high. The high calorie content of sugar water gives them just what they need. Sugar water is not all these birds eat however, sugar just provides the energy for their other course. About one third of hummingbirds diets consist of small insects and spiders which they often catch in mid-air.

Once they mate, the female hummingbird builds the nest and raises the young by herself. The nest is about the size of half a walnut shell. She builds the nest out of grass and twigs held together by spider webbing which she finds and carries back. This unique building material allows the nest to actually stretch as the chicks rapidly grow. Two pea sized eggs are laid about three days apart and the female incubates them for twelve to sixteen days. For those of you wondering how a baby bird with such a long beak could possibly fit in a pea sized egg, it's simple: the baby birds do not get that long beak until they are older!

The chicks grow at an astounding rate and keep their mom busy constantly. By the time they are ready to leave the nest and fend for themselves, they might weigh close to twice what their nearly exhausted mother does!

If you see a hummingbird nest, remember where it is at because typically the birds use the same nest for several years. The birds' life span is around five years but captive birds in zoos have lived as long as 14 years.

For more information on hummingbirds visit http://hummingbirds.net/

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