[Tweeters] Hummingbird Behavior

[creinsch]

Dayna,

Over the years we have seen hummingbirds do a lot that appeared to us as 
strange.  But, this morning, I saw an adult male Anna's attacking a 
younger (hatch year probably) bird on a feeder.  The feeder has been 
defended by the adult for months, but I had never seen it do this.  From 
my view in the kitchen at about 8am this morning, I could see the 
adult's head on the opposite side of the feeder, but could not make out 
what it was doing.  Walking around to another window though, I could see 
it was on top of a younger bird beating its head with its beak.  The 
immature bird was not moving or defending itself.  I opened the back 
door about, 4 feet from the feeder, but the adult ignored me.  The 
feeder is not in a position that I could reach, so I went and got a yard 
stick, and used that to gently lift up the tail of the adult, which 
startled it, and broke its grip on the smaller bird.  But the smaller 
did not move.  I did the same thing with the yardstick to it, and it 
finally took flight, with the adult in pursuit.   Shortly, the adult 
returned.  Hopefully the younger one found one of our other, less 
defended, feeders.

We've seen mating, it is noisy, but very brief, generally with the two 
birds spiraling toward the earth or into a bush.

It has been years since I thought about Ardrey's "amity-enmity 
complex".  Where, at one point, he proposes that environmental hazards 
might promote cooperation (amity) among a given species, here it seems 
we may be seeing it doing just the opposite.  Well, unlike penguins, 
hummingbirds live relatively short solitary lives, and they are fiercely 
territorial.

Chuck Reinsch
Magnolia