Common name: Hummingbird

Type: Bird

Family: Trochilidae

Range: When you consider about the range of hummingbirds, they are restricted to the places including the southern Alaska to Tierra del Fuego and the Caribbean of America. You can find out majority of species in the Central and South America normally in tropical and subtropical ranges including Mexico and the Costa Rica. Compared to the species find in the southern South America, Canada, the Caribbean Islands and the United States, the number species available in the Central America, Southern Mexico and the Atlantic forests are high range.

Size: When you consider about the size of this bird, the height and the weight normally vary depending on the species. This bird probably has 5 to 13 cm long and weighs around 2 to 20 grams (0.07 to 0.07 oz.).

Diet: These hummingbirds normally drink the sweet liquid inside the certain flowers and the nectar as food. Since nectar is the poor source for providing nutrients, these birds prefer to go through the prey including insects and spiders for fulfilling the needs for minerals, amino acids, vitamins and protein.

Average lifespan: The average lifespan of the hummingbird is normally 2 to 5 years. In the rare case, these birds can live up to 12 years in the wild, if there are no disturbances for them.

Habitat: There are 25 different species of hummingbirds available throughout the world and it is mainly recorded from the United States. In small Ecuador areas, the species range would be 130 and 10 from Canada. When you consider about the species richness, then it would probably be available in the humid tropical and subtropical forests those you can see in the Northern Andes and its adjacent foothills. Most of the species normally prefers to breed in the climates with temperature and also at the highlands along with the altitudes of up to 5,200 meters (17,100 ft.).

Breeding/Reproduction: When you consider about the nesting of this bird, normally the male humming birds don’t take part in building of nest. Most of the species in this category build out the nest in the shape of cup that too on the shrub or branch of a tree, even though most of the species prefer to attach their nests to leaves. The size of the nest may be varied in the diameter depending on the type of species. In order to secure the structure of nest with the support, most of the humming bird species want to bind the nest materials together with the help of spider silk. The silk would probably be more helpful for the growing young because of its nest expanding capability with unique properties.

During the breeding season, the female hummingbird lays 2 eggs those are normally smaller than other eggs and it is largely relative to the size of the adult. The incubation period may be varied depending on the type of species and normally it would be 14 to 23 days. Incubation also depends on the female attractiveness and the ambient temperature of the nest. Normally the nestlings are fed by their mother with nectar and small arthropods. The mother would probably insert the bill into the nestling mouth that is opened one along with the food as regulated into its crop.

Most of the hummingbird species available on the earth have their plumage as the bright one along with the exotic coloration. When you consider about the color, in most of the cases it normally comes from the prism-like cells they have particularly on the top layers of the feathers and not from the pigmentation of feather structure. When these cells are hit by light, they would probably split into different wavelengths in order to reflect with the intensity in varying degrees to the observer.

If you go through the feather structure of this bird, it would probably act as the one with a diffraction grating. Because of this reason, the bird with muted-looking could probably turn into fiery red or vivid green suddenly when it shifted with the position. But, not all the hummingbird colors would go with this that too because of the prism feather structure. Normally the colors of hummingbirds came from the combination of melanin pigmentation and the refraction.

These hummingbirds have their bills as long and straight one, but in some species they have their bill with adapted shape for the specialized feeding purpose. Sharp bills are normally adapted for collecting nectar from flowers through feeding with the help of short corollas and also to pierce the bases of longer ones. They have their thorn bills as short one. In order to collect the nectar from the curved corollas, they are adapted with the sickle bills those are extremely curved one.

When hummingbirds prefer to feed on nectar, their bills are usually open only slightly in order to allow the tongue to dart out and also to get into the interior of flowers. These birds have the capability to assess the amount of sugar present in the nectar they eat and they ignore the flower types that produce the nectar with sugar amount less than 100%. They normally prefer with the nectar of stronger sugar content.

The efficient and interesting fact about these hummingbirds would be their drinking capacity via capillary action and that too revealed with the help of high-speed photography. When they want to drink nectar, the tubes of tongue would probably open downsides and close around the nectar. Since they have the prohibited energy cost, these birds normally don’t spend more time in flying. Most of the time they prefer to sit and perch. These birds normally feed with small meals and they consume invertebrates up to twelve times of their own body weight as nectar each day. These birds would spend their 10% to 15% time in feeding and 75% to 80% time in sitting and digesting.

These birds normally behave as very territorial one in the case of food. When a hummingbird finds out the consistent food source like the artificial feeder, they would probably fight with other hummingbirds in order to attain the complete dominance over the particular food source. Because of the rapid metabolisms, these birds have their lifespans as long one. But, most of the birds die badly in their first year because of the hatching and fledging.

For newly married couples, Costa Rica can be a good place to visit and enjoy their earlier married days. When they visit Costa Rica, Hummingbirds surely raise their feelings and create more memorable moments for them. Newly married couples can walk around in gardens of Costa Rica and can enjoy the beautiful sceneries and flowers that attract Hummingbirds as well.