Hummingbird: Meaning (information, definition, explanation, facts)

Hummingbirds

Ruby-throated Hummingbird
Scientific classification
: Animalia
Phylum

:

 Chordata
Class

:

 Aves
Order

:

 Trochiliformes
Family

:

 Trochilidae
Genera
Many: see text

Introduction

Hummingbirds (family Trochilidae) are small birds capable of hovering in mid-air due to the rapid flapping of their wings (15 to 80 beats per second, depending on the size of the bird). They are the only birds that can fly backwards.

They are named for the characteristic hum of this rapid wing motion, and are attracted to many flowering plants such as shrimp plants. Hummingbirds feed on the nectar of these plants. They are important pollinators, especially of deep throated flowers. Most species also eat insects.

They are especially attracted to red flowers. Hummingbirds will use feeders, particularly red ones. A suitable artificial nectar consists of one part sugar to four parts water. It is easiest to dissolve the sugar in boiling water, then cool it completely before putting it out for the birds. If hummingbirds are fed in this way, dyes should be avoided, as should honey as it attracts bees. The feeder should be cleaned and the water changed weekly, or more often in warm weather.

Their attraction to the color red creates a problem for some hummingbirds: many of them fly into garages and become trapped. It is widely believed that this is because they mistake the hanging (usually red-colored) door release handle for a flower. Once inside, they may be unable to escape because their natural instinct when threatened or trapped is to fly upward. This is a life-threatening situation for hummingbirds, as they can become exhausted and die in a relatively short period of time, possibly as little as an hour.

Male hummingbirds are usually brightly coloured, females duller. The males take no part in nesting. The nest is usually a neat cup in a tree. Two white eggs are laid, which are quite small, but large relative to the bird's size. Incubation is typically 14-19 days.

The Bee Hummingbird (Mellisuga helenae) is, at 1.8 grams, the smallest bird in the world. A typical North American hummingbird, the Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris) weighs approximately 3 grams, length 7.6 cm (3 in).

Location

Hummingbirds are only found in the Americas. The Black-chinned Hummingbird is the most common species in the western United States and Canada. Only the Ruby-throated Hummingbird breeds in eastern North America, but occasional members of other hummingbird species ("accidentals" in birding jargon) are seen in the east of North America, sometimes as vagrants from Cuba or the Bahamas.

There is an increasing trend for Rufous Hummingbirds to migrate east to winter in the eastern United States, rather than south to Central America; this trend being the result of increased survival with the provision of artificial feeders in gardens – in the past, individuals that migrated east would usually die, but now they survive, and their tendency to migrate east is inherited by their offspring. Provided sufficient food and shelter is available, they are surprisingly hardy, able to tolerate temperatures down to at least -20°C.

In Artistic Depiction

The Aztec god Huitzilopochtli is often depicted as a hummingbird.

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Taxonomy

Traditionally hummingbirds were placed in the order Apodiformes, which also contains the swifts. In the modern Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy, hummingbirds are separated as a new hummingbird order Trochiliformes.

There are between 325-340 species of hummingbird, depending on taxonomic viewpoint, divided into two subfamilies, the hermits (subfamily Phaethornithinae, 34 species in six genera), and the typical hummingbirds (subfamily Trochilinae, all the others).

Hummingbirds have been thought to have evolved in South America, and the great majority of the species are found there. All the most familiar North American species are thought to be of relatively recent origin, and are therefore (following the usual procedure of lists starting with more 'ancestral' species and ending with the most recent) listed close to the end of the list.

Genetic analysis has indicated that hummingbirds diverged from other birds 30 to 40 million years ago, but fossil evidence has proved elusive. Fossil hummingbirds have been found as old as a million years, but older fossils had not been securely identifiable as hummingbirds. Then, in 2004, Dr. Gerald Mayr of the Senkenberg natural history museum in Frankfurt-am-Main identified two 30-million-year old German hummingbird fossils and published his results in Nature. The fossils of the extinct hummingbird species, Eurotrochilus inexpectatus ("unexpected European hummingbird") had been sitting in a museum drawer in Stuttgart. They had been unearthed in a claypit in Frauenweiler.

Subfamily Phaethornithinae

Subfamily Trochilinae

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