[Tweeters] Torpor in Hummers

[Robert O'Brien via Tweeters]

Over decades of birding I've experienced 'torpor' or 'not' twice.  This
seems an appropriate time to discuss them for possible feedback.

1.  I had a hummer feeder on my front porch.  When I went to refill the
feeder I accidentally dropped and broke it.  No backup.  So I got an olive
jar about 2"x 4"deep, filled it with 'the, 'juice' and fashioned a way to
attach it.  That worked fine.  The male Rufous just landed on the edge and
sipped away.  I sorta forgot about it, but one day, when I returned home, I
happened to glance at the jar and noticed an apparently dead male Rufous,
bill down in the jar, now empty of juice..  I guess it had to dip further
and further down, until it actually fell in.  Oh, no.  No idea how long it
had been in there, but I knew about torpor, so I cupped it in my hand for
warmth and went into the house.  In 5-10 minutes I felt a 'stirring'  5 or
so minutes later, I released it back outside, apparently none the worse for
wear..  Great.

But, conversely.  Years ago, we had 3 or 4 nights here, SE of Portland,
with a low of 6 degrees F.  I had a bona fide feeder back on the porch that
I took in during the night so it did not freeze.  I got up each morning
when it was just barely light to replace the feeder in case any hummers
were surviving, which seemed unlikely.  When I did this the first morning,
a female Anna's immediately flew up from low weeds on the ground 15 feet
away, and started partaking.  This repeated the following two nights after
which it warmed up.
Now, this hummer was undoubtedly in Torpor (or not?) during the night,
aided likely by some amount of ground heat to prevent freezing, even in
Torpor.  So,
2.  How did the hummer know to spend the night on the ground?
3.  How is it that the hummer was 'awake' at barely first light, as though
waiting for me to replace the feeder.   I don't think they can come out of
torpor immediately, can they?
And at 6 degrees I wasn't loitering on my porch, I put the feeder up and
the hummer arrived immediately.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?            Bob OBrien  Portland
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