I lived in California a few years and I remember seeing a lot humming birds.

rick longworth

Published on Sep 2, 2018

I've been watching and filming my local hummingbird community since I arrived in Idaho in April. So far I've identified black chinned (Archilochus alexandri) and rufous hummingbirds(Selasphorus rufus). I was lucky to capture three types of feeding behavior shown in the attached film.

1. In addition to flower nectar, hummingbirds eat lots of tiny bugs. They are usually ambush predators, waiting on their favorite perch for insects of the right size to fly by. The clip shows a female rufous hummingbird detecting and attacking a moth overhead. The clip is shown in normal speed and then slowed down.

2. Another approach to gathering protean is to be fortunate enough to land next to a tasty morsel as seen in the second clip, also shown twice. It's another female rufous.

3. Finally, a black chinned female demonstrates the familiar method of sipping nectar. A hummingbird visits about 2000 blossoms a day to get enough glucose.