A Connecticut Yankee in the Tropics: a Naturalist's Tales.: Hummingbirds in the hand and hovering around

Hummingbirds are one of the main focuses and quite frankly one of the reasons finca pura vida is so special. We have eleven species that occur around the area and ten that visit our feeder array on a daily basis. For the last four years we’ve been catching hummingbirds with mist nets and customized traps. We’ve been fortunate enough to band hundreds of birds at this point, so the main goal now is to catch recaptures and answer some of our research questions. I thought I would just show a few photos of hummingbirds and share a few quick notes about what we’ve seen so far this year. I promise to have a fun more exploratory literary post soon.

Green-breasted Mango (Anthracothorax prevostii)

Female Blue-throated Sapphire (Hylocharis eliciae)

Cinnamon Hummingbird (Amazilia rutila)

So far we’re already seeing some great recaptures, we recaptured a Green-breasted Mango and a Steely-vented Hummingbird. Both species are residents that feed year round at the finca, these captures lead to the greater understanding of site fidelity amongst resident species. Most resident species move around during the year, corresponding with different flowering trees and the climate. It’s interesting to note that species of the dry forests can grow accustomed to a certain area outside the breeding season as their main form of food resource.

Steely-vented Hummingbird (Amazilia saucerottei)

Green-breasted Mango (Anthracothorax prevostii) recapture

The other great capture we’ve had so far is the adult male Ruby-throated Hummingbird. This is the only North American migrant we have on Nicoya, the small spunky migrant joins the cast of the much larger resident species here. These small birds join the mix of aggressive hummingbirds battling it out to gain resources during this time of year. This individual we banded last year, flew back to North America, hopefully successfully breed, than flew all the way back to Costa Rica. There’s something magical about the thought of a bird weighing less than a penny making the thousand-mile journey. I’ve flown over just a small portion of Costa Rica before, looking down it’s like an ocean of green, I can’t imagine what it must look like to these small birds. Somehow though it founds it’s way back to our small patch of green in the mosaic and once again joins the scarp battle for food over the next few months.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird (Archilochus colubris)

Last are a few photos illustrating Hummingbirds in isolated motions, giving a fileting glimpse into the beauty of their in flight aerobatics. When frozen like this they almost dance in the air, slowly moving thorough the air to their final destination a flower in this instance. You can definitely expect to see more hummingbirds posts in the future, their too fascinating not to share.