13 Strange Things Hummingbirds Do That Most People Miss
They fly backward, shut down overnight and keep a mental map of every flower in your yard. The smallest birds in the garden are also the oddest.
Most of us see a hummingbird for three seconds at a time, hovering at a flower before it zips away. Watch for longer and you start to notice some very peculiar habits.
Nearly all of them trace back to one fact. A hummingbird lives closer to the edge of its energy supply than any other bird. A Ruby-throat weighs about three grams, a tenth of an ounce. Its wings beat around fifty times a second, its heart can pass 1,200 beats a minute in flight, and it must drink more than its own weight in nectar every day to keep going. A few hours without food would be dangerous.
Everything strange about these birds is a solution to that problem. The way they fly, the way they sleep, the way they fight and the way they remember all come down to getting sugar quickly and wasting none of it.
Here are thirteen behaviors worth looking out for, with notes on when and where to see each one. Most happen in ordinary gardens, in plain view, and are over in seconds.
Read all the way to the end. We save their most astonishing feat, a nonstop sea crossing, for last.
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Overnight
1. They go into a nightly mini-hibernation
Ever seen this?A hummingbird cannot feed in the dark, and at its daytime rate of burning fuel it would not last until morning. So on cool nights it shuts down. This state is called torpor.
The change is drastic. Body temperature falls from about 104 degrees Fahrenheit to within a few degrees of the air around it, sometimes into the 50s or lower. The heart slows from several hundred beats a minute to around fifty. Breathing becomes shallow and irregular and can stop for seconds at a time. Energy use drops by as much as 95 percent.
AdvertisementComing out of it takes work. Starting about an hour before dawn, the bird shivers its flight muscles to generate heat, and it needs twenty minutes or more to reach flying temperature. Then it heads straight for breakfast.
Torpor is most frequent on cold nights, in the mountains, during migration and whenever a bird went to roost short of food.
Watch for itA bird sitting motionless at first light, fluffed up with its bill pointed skyward and eyes closed, is waking from torpor. Leave it alone and watch from a distance. It will fly within half an hour.Advertisement -
Overnight
2. They sometimes hang upside down
Ever seen this?Every year people find a hummingbird dangling beneath a feeder perch or a twig by its feet, motionless, and assume it has died. It almost never has.
A perching bird's toes lock around a branch when its legs bend, with no muscular effort. That is how birds sleep without falling. A hummingbird in deep torpor has so little muscle tone that if it tips forward or backward it simply swings under the perch, and the locked toes keep hold.
It can hang like that for hours. As the morning warms and its body temperature climbs, it stirs, flutters and either pulls itself upright or lets go and flies.
AdvertisementThis is seen most often at feeders on cold mornings in spring and fall, and in winter along the Pacific coast, where Anna's Hummingbirds ride out frosty nights.
It looks dead. It is asleep more deeply than almost any other bird can sleep.
Watch for itDo not touch it or bring it indoors. Watch for twenty to thirty minutes. Only if it is still hanging limp well into a warm morning should you call a wildlife rehabilitator. -
Flight
3. They fly backward
Ever seen this?Hummingbirds are the only birds that fly backward as a matter of routine, under full control, for as long as they like. They also fly sideways, straight up and straight down, and can pivot on the spot.
AdvertisementThe secret is in the shoulder. Most birds flap up and down and get lift only on the downstroke. A hummingbird's wing is nearly rigid from shoulder to tip and swivels at the shoulder joint, so the wingtip sweeps forward, flips over and sweeps back, tracing a flattened figure eight. It gets lift on both strokes, about three quarters on the downstroke and a quarter on the upstroke. Insects fly the same way.
By tilting that figure eight forward or back, the bird moves in any direction without turning its body. Backward flight costs it no more energy than hovering.
The flight muscles that power all this make up about a quarter of the bird's weight.
Watch for itWatch how a bird leaves a flower or a feeder port. It does not turn around. It reverses straight out, pauses and then swings away.Advertisement -
Display
4. Males dive at great speed
Ever seen this?In the breeding season a male climbs steeply, sometimes to a hundred feet or more, then turns and plunges past a perched female, pulling out at the bottom and climbing again. He may repeat it a dozen times.
Each species has its own flight path. The Ruby-throat swings through a wide, shallow U. Anna's drops in a near-vertical J. Allen's, Rufous, Broad-tailed and Calliope each trace their own shapes.
Anna's Hummingbird is the best studied. High-speed film shows the male reaching close to 60 miles an hour, which works out to nearly 400 body lengths a second, the fastest speed relative to size measured in any vertebrate. As he pulls up he endures about ten times the force of gravity.
AdvertisementThe loud chirp at the bottom of the dive is not a call. He snaps his tail open for a split second, and air rushing over the narrow outer feathers makes them vibrate like a reed.
For its size, a diving Anna's Hummingbird is the fastest vertebrate ever measured.
Watch for itListen in spring for a sharp squeak, buzz or pop from the sky, then look up. On the Pacific coast, Anna's males start diving in December. In the East, watch Ruby-throats in May. -
Display
5. They swing like a pendulum
Ever seen this?The second courtship display is shorter, closer and easier to see. The male flies rapidly from side to side in a tight horizontal arc, just a foot or two wide, directly in front of a female perched low in a shrub. It is called the shuttle display.
AdvertisementHe faces her the whole time with his throat feathers flared, so the color flashes on and off as his angle to the sun changes. His wings buzz far louder than in normal flight. A Ruby-throat's wings, which beat about fifty times a second when he hovers, can reach around two hundred a second in display.
Males also turn a version of this on rivals, and on people, dogs and cats that come too close to a favorite perch.
It is all he contributes. After mating, the male takes no part in building the nest, incubating the eggs or feeding the young.
AdvertisementWatch for itLook for it low down near feeders and flower beds in the first weeks after the birds arrive in spring. The loud, rhythmic buzzing gives it away. -
Feeding
6. Their tongue works like a pump
Ever seen this?A hummingbird does not suck nectar through its bill like a straw. It laps, and the tongue it laps with is one of the most ingenious tools in nature.
The tongue is long, about twice the length of the bill, and when it is not in use it retracts into a sheath that wraps around the back of the skull. The front half is split into two tips, each rolled into an open groove and edged with a fine fringe.
AdvertisementFor well over a century the textbooks said nectar rose into those grooves by capillary action. High-speed video published in 2011 and 2015 proved otherwise. The bird squeezes the tongue flat as it pushes it out. When the tip enters the nectar the grooves spring open and fill instantly, and the fringes close around the liquid as the tongue pulls back. No suction is involved.
The cycle repeats more than a dozen times a second, so a feeding visit that looks like one long sip is dozens of separate licks.
Watch for itAt a clear-sided feeder, watch the nectar under the port. You can see the pale tongue flickering in and out, reaching well past the tip of the bill. -
Memory
7. They remember every flower
Ever seen this?A flower that has just been drained is worthless until it refills. A hummingbird that revisited empty flowers would burn more energy than it gained, so it keeps track.
AdvertisementField experiments with wild Rufous Hummingbirds in the Canadian Rockies have shown how good that tracking is. Birds offered arrays of artificial flowers learned the position of each one after a single visit and avoided those they had emptied. When some flowers were refilled every ten minutes and others every twenty, the birds learned both schedules and timed their returns to match.
They rely on location more than color. Move a feeder six feet and returning birds hover at the empty spot first.
The memory lasts across seasons and thousands of miles. The part of the brain that handles spatial memory is, in proportion to the rest of the brain, larger in hummingbirds than in any other bird studied.
AdvertisementA hummingbird knows which flowers it has emptied, and roughly when each will be full again.
Watch for itIn spring, before you have put anything out, watch the exact spot where last year's feeder hung. Returning birds hover there, sometimes on the very day they arrive. -
Memory
8. They know who fills the feeder
Ever seen this?Ask anyone who has fed hummingbirds for a few years and you will hear the same story. The feeder runs dry, and a bird flies to the kitchen window and hovers there, or comes straight to the person's face when they step outside.
Banders and rehabilitators who handle hummingbirds daily describe the same thing. Birds approach a familiar person who brings food and keep their distance from strangers.
AdvertisementThe explanation lies in what hummingbirds are already good at. They are superb at linking a place and an event with food. The person who walks out with a full feeder is the most reliable signal in the yard that nectar is about to appear, and the birds learn it within days. They also learn which window that person tends to stand behind.
They are fearless enough to act on it. A hummingbird's speed means it has little to fear from a slow-moving human.
Watch for itIf one hovers a foot from your face, buzzing, and then flies toward the feeder and back, check the nectar. Then stand still beside the freshly filled feeder. Regular birds will often feed within arm's reach.Advertisement -
Temper
9. They attack much bigger birds
Ever seen this?Hummingbirds defend food with a ferocity out of all proportion to their size. A good patch of flowers is worth fighting for, and a bird that can outfly anything in the sky pays little for picking fights.
Most battles are with other hummingbirds. They start with a chattering warning, then a flared tail and gorget, then a chase. Now and then two birds collide and tumble to the ground locked together, jabbing with bills and feet.
Bigger birds get the same treatment. Hummingbirds dive at jays, crows, orioles and woodpeckers near the feeder or the nest, and at hawks perched or soaring in the neighborhood. They strafe the intruder's head and back from behind, where it cannot easily strike. The hawk nearly always moves on.
Rufous Hummingbirds are the most pugnacious species in North America and regularly evict birds larger than themselves.
AdvertisementWatch for itWatch the sky above a feeder in late July and August, when numbers peak and tempers are shortest. A small speck harrying a large bird across the yard is very often a hummingbird. -
Bathing
10. They wash on wet leaves
Ever seen this?Hummingbirds bathe every day when they can, and they have no use for a conventional birdbath. The water is too deep, and their legs are too short and weak to wade.
Instead they bathe in flight or against something wet. After rain or heavy dew, a bird will press its chest to a broad leaf and slide across it, wings fluttering, then turn and wet the other side. Others hover in the spray of a sprinkler or fly through it again and again. Some sit on a twig in light rain with feathers fluffed and bill raised, simply letting it fall.
AdvertisementAfterward comes a long session of preening. The bird runs each wing feather through its bill, takes oil from the gland at the base of its tail and scratches its head with a foot.
Feathers gummed with nectar and pollen fly poorly, so none of this is idle.
Watch for itRun a mister over a leafy shrub on a warm afternoon and wait at a distance. Large, slightly cupped leaves, such as those of hosta, canna or sunflower, are the favorite washcloths. -
Hunting
11. They steal from spider webs
Ever seen this?Spiders supply hummingbirds twice over. In spring females gather web silk by the beakful to bind their nests. All season long, both sexes treat webs as a pantry.
AdvertisementA hunting bird hovers in front of an orb web and inspects it strand by strand, then delicately plucks out trapped gnats, midges and fruit flies without touching the sticky lines. Small spiders are taken as readily as their prey, and so are the spider's egg sacs.
This is theft with real risk. A hummingbird that blunders into the web of a large orb-weaver can become wrapped in silk and unable to free its wings, and birds are occasionally found trapped this way.
Insects and spiders supply the protein that nectar lacks, and a bird gleaning along a row of webs under the eaves is doing serious foraging, not playing.
AdvertisementWatch for itLook for a bird hovering slowly and carefully along the eaves, a porch railing or a hedge, stopping every foot or so and making small forward darts. It is working the webs. -
Drying off
12. They shake like a wet dog
Ever seen this?Hummingbirds keep feeding in the rain, because they cannot afford to stop. A raindrop, though, is a heavy thing to a bird that weighs three grams, and soaked feathers add weight and steal heat.
So the bird shakes, and it can do it without landing. In light rain it stays level. In a heavy downpour it tilts its body nearly upright and beats its wings flatter and faster to stay aloft. Every so often it shakes its head, body and tail in a single violent twist, and the water flies off in a spray.
AdvertisementHigh-speed filming of Anna's Hummingbirds shows the whole shake lasts about a tenth of a second. The head whips through a wide arc so fast that the feathers at the tip of the bill experience many times the force of gravity, and the bird holds its place in the air throughout.
A perched hummingbird does the same thing after bathing.
Watch for itYou will need to be watching closely on a wet day. Look for a brief blur and a fine halo of spray around a hovering bird. It is over almost before it starts. -
Migration
13. They nearly double their weight
Ever seen this?By late July the days are shortening, and that change triggers a burst of feeding. A hummingbird preparing to migrate visits flowers and feeders from first light to dusk and converts the sugar to fat, stored under the skin of the back, belly and throat.
AdvertisementA Ruby-throat that weighs three grams in June can weigh close to six by the time it leaves. It needs every bit. Many Ruby-throats fly straight across the Gulf of Mexico from the northern Gulf Coast to the Yucatan Peninsula, about 500 miles over open water. The crossing takes eighteen to twenty-two hours of nonstop flight, and the bird arrives at close to its lean weight again.
Others follow the Texas coast around the Gulf instead. Rufous Hummingbirds fuel up the same way in mountain meadows on their way from Alaska and the Northwest to Mexico.
AdvertisementEach bird travels alone, by day, including youngsters only a few months old that have never made the trip.
A bird the weight of a nickel sets out over 500 miles of open water with no place to land.
Watch for itLate summer birds look plump and round-bellied, and they feed in long, unhurried bouts. Keep the feeders full and fresh from August until two weeks after you see the last one.
The short version
Put a chair near your feeder and stay for twenty minutes. Once you know what to look for, a hummingbird stops being a blur and becomes one of the most entertaining animals in the garden.
Timing helps. Go out at first light on a cool morning to see birds waking from torpor. Watch in the first weeks of spring for dives and shuttle displays, on warm afternoons for bathing, and in late July and August for the chases and the heavy feeding that comes before migration. Binoculars that focus down to six or eight feet turn a good view into a remarkable one.
The more you watch, the clearer the pattern becomes. Nothing these birds do is random. Every odd habit, from the overnight shutdown to the backward exit from a flower, is the answer of a very small animal to a very large energy bill. That is worth twenty minutes of anyone's morning.
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