Hummingbird Facts

Size
Hummingbirds vary in size from 2 ¼ inches to 8 ½ inches.

Weight
Hummingbirds weigh only a few grams, although the Giant Hummingbird weighs nearly 20 grams.

Food
They mainly eat nectar, but also some pollen, insects and spiders.

Life Span
The average life of a hummingbird is 3-4 years, although one specimen was caught in 1976 in Colorado, banded, and captured again in 1987.

Reproduction
Hummingbirds lay 2 eggs. A hummingbird's egg is about the size of a pea.

Colors
Hummingbirds get their unusual coloring from the fact that not all feathers are pigmented, or colored. In the duller colors, including the Rufous Hummingbird, the brown hue is actual pigment in the feather structure. In the ruby-throated variety, light refracting through the feather segments, breaking it up much like a prism would. Only certain levels of color will be seen by the human eye, and that color will change with every movement of the feather, or angle of the light striking it.

Habitat
Mountains, woodlands, rain forests, and grasslands throughout North, Central and South America, and the Caribbean provide hummingbird homes.

Interesting Facts
An average hummingbird consumes half its weight in nectar each day.

Hummingbirds can reach speeds up to 60 miles an hour.

Their wings beat 78 times per second during regular flight and up to 2000 times during a dive.

A hummingbird's heart beats 1,260 times per minute.

All this activity requires a hummingbird to eat almost continually, to fuel the activity that will maintain its 105-109F body temperature. That means dining as many as 15 times an hour, on high-energy food. A hummingbird can starve to death in as little as two hours, if still active.

Nests are small, typically 1.25-1.5 inches in diameter, and perhaps an inch high.

They lap nectar with their tongues.

Sub Species
338 species are known.