Amazing Facts About Hummingbirds You Did Not Know

Each spring in many parts of North America, as the snow melts and the days get longer, we eagerly await the return of hummingbirds. Hummingbird feeders are retrieved from storage, washed, and filled with nectar. We hang them outside in a strategic location and then we watch and wait.

There are about 330 different species of hummingbirds. Most of them live and remain in Central and South America, never venturing any further north – only 16 species breed in North America. Here are more interesting facts about hummingbirds:

• Hummingbirds occur only in the Americas.
• Scientists divide the hummingbirds up into two subfamilies: typical hummingbirds and hermit hummingbirds. They are thought to be closely related to swifts.
• The smallest hummingbird, the Bee Hummingbird, weighs a little under two grams. The largest, the Giant Hummingbird, weighs 21 to 23 grams.
• Hummingbirds eat plant nectar, plant pollen, and insects – but their diet is 90 percent nectar.
• Like bees, hummingbirds carry pollen from one plant to another while they are feeding, thus playing an important role in plant pollination. Each bird visits between one and two thousand blossoms each day.
• Hummingbirds can see ultraviolet light, which may enable them to identify certain varieties of plant.
• Though we generally see them in flight, hummingbirds perch for most of their lives.
• On average, hummingbird wings beat about 80 times each second, but in some species 200 beats a second has been documented.
• A hummingbird breathes 300 to 500 times each minute while active.
• The hummingbird heart is about 20 percent of the bird’s body volume. It beats about 500 times a minute. Heartbeats vary between different species and during different activities, and range from 30 to 1200 beats a minute.
• Hummingbirds sometimes enter a state of torpor, usually during the night when they are not feeding. In torpor, metabolism slows down saving up to 60 percent of the bird’s available energy.
• After feeding and doubling its weight,, the Ruby-throated Hummingbird flies nonstop across the Gulf of Mexico during migration. The flight takes about 20 hours.
• Hummingbirds are the only bird that can fly backward. They can fly up, down, forward, backward, sideways, do barrel rolls, even fly upside down, and stand still–hovering motionless in mid-air! They can rise vertically and and hover, or act like yo-yos flying up and down!
• Hummingbirds have the fastest wing beat of any bird. Averaging 80 beats per second, and up to 200 beats during courtship dives! They can stop in mid-air with a jolt that would send a pilot flying out of an airplane!
• They can swivel their wings almost 180 degrees and the speed of their wings resembles the blur of the rotory blades of a helicopter! Marvels in maneuverability in flight and in their anatomy, aerodynamic experts have not been able to figure out how they manage to fly believing that body structure makes it anatomically impossible!
• Their wing muscles account for at least 25-30% of their body weight! To meet the energy requirements of a hummingbird, a 170 lb. man would have to consume 285 lbs. (that’s POUNDS!), of hamburgers a day!
• Contrary to popular belief, hummingbirds aren’t attracted to flowers for their fragrance, but for their color! They seem to prefer red, but any bright color will do!
• Hummingbirds have huge appetites too- dining on over 1500 flowers per day!