Animalism: How Hummingbirds Do It

Hummingbirds mate in flight. Photography by Paul Hakimata/Shutterstock)

A bird endemic to the Americas, hummingbirds are characterized by their short stature and dart-like movements. But when it comes to mating, do these aerial experts equally keep it fast or take a slow and steady approach? "Given their tendency to congregate around flowers and artificial feed, one might think that hummingbirds are social animals, but this is far from the truth. In fact, hummingbirds are generally solitary, territorial birds, and most of the time, they can "Hummingbirds are quite aggressive toward each other, regardless of gender," says behavioral ecologist Christine Hume of the University of Connecticut. Limit their social interactions to foraging and mating, said Alejandro Rico Guevara, an ecologist and evolutionary biologist at the University of Connecticut and the University of California, Berkeley. Breeding seasons vary among species. , but often coincides with rainfall, causing insect populations to boom. This rich source of protein is necessary for feather moulting and egg laying, as well as feeding chicks [Photos of Hummingbirds from Around the World]

How Hummingbirds Mate. Also varies "Each species has a special ritual or mating display," Rico Guevara told LiveScience

Forest-dwelling hummingbirds (of the subfamily Phaethornithinae) typically follow A so-called lek mating system in which males gather in an open area to try to woo the females, who visit the males one after another, maintain small territories, and begin chirping. This sound seems very loud to the human ear. Simple, but it actually encompasses the complexity of what happens when a computer slows down and [hummingbirds] can not only be seen at high speeds, but also heard at high speeds," said Rico Guevara,

one. An impressive female hummingbird will perch near a singing male, prompting him to perform tricks to further seduce her. These seductive movements may include making sounds with their beaks, flying around the female, flying side by side in front of the female, and displaying their tail and feathers.

Fighting is not uncommon in male competition. Many species have even evolved beak-like weapons with jagged tips that resemble teeth to help them in combat. In these fights, males would try to stab, bite, pluck each other's feathers and engage in aerial fencing, Rico Guevara said, but, Hume added, it wasn't clear. Whether these fights cause serious or fatal injuries is due to the speed at which they occur and the fact that the fighting pairs are often flown

Many other types of hummingbirds do not use the lion mating system. Instead, males build individual homes to ward off other hummingbirds. Christopher Clark, a biologist at the University of California, Riverside, said that in some cases, males will leave their territory to find females, but more often, it's the opposite, and females will move in after hearing the males singing. Male territory,

When the female arrives, the male displays for her and shows her how well he flies. Clark told Live Science that one common maneuver is called a shuttle display, in which a male hovers in front of a potential mate, slowly moving side to side, up and down.

One of the more spectacular displays is called the courtship dive, a move that only a small percentage of hummingbirds perform (the bee-hummingbird call). This dive involves flying high above a perched female and then quickly dive-bombing her. When at the lowest point of a dive, the male spreads and closes its tail feathers, allowing air to flow over them, causing them to flutter and make sounds.

"Each species has a unique tail shape and a unique sound," Clark said, adding that there is strong indirect evidence that the AT's sound is important to females, although it's not yet clear which females What type of tail chirp do you like. Nor is it known which physical features of women, such as skin color and body shape, are most attractive.

Once the female chooses a mate, she will let him climb on her back; the male will then line up his cloaca (excretory and reproductive openings) with hers and transfer ***. It was a quick thing, lasting only a few seconds.

The act is complete and the two will go their separate ways, Hume said, adding, "The male does not provide any parental care."

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