Red throated Hummingbird

"Archilochus colubris"

J.S

Kingdom | Phylum | Class | Order | Family | Genus and Species

Fun Facts | Art and Poetry | Cool Sites | Works Cited

Animal Name: Red throated Hummingbird

Kingdom: Animalia

Characteristics that place it here

• Heterothroph

• Nucleus

• Multicellar

• Eats

• Repoductive Sexually

• Movement

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Phylum: Chodata

Characteristics that place it here

• bilateral symmetry
• segmented body, including segmented muscles
• three germ layers and a well-developed coelom.
• single, dorsal, hollow nerve cord, usually with an enlarged anterior end (brain)
• tail projecting beyond (posterior to) the anus at some stage of development
• pharyngeal pouches present at some stage of development
• ventral heart, with dorsal and ventral blood vessels and a closed blood system
• complete digestive system
• bony or cartilaginous endoskeleton usually present.

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Class: Aves

Characteristics that place it here

• horny beak,
• no teeth
•  large muscular stomach feathers
•  large yolked, hard-shelled eggs. The parent bird provides extensive care of the young until it is grown, or gets some other bird to look after the young.
• strong skeleton

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Order: Apodiformes

Characteristics that place it here

• Thought to have only fly
• small and weak
• Apodiformes means no feet

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Family: Trochilidae

 Characteristics that place it here

• small bird

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Genius and Species: Archilochus colubris

 Characteristics that place it here

• Archilochs means first in importance and an ambush

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Fun Facts

• Ruby-throated hummingbirds eat insects and nectar from many flowering plants.

• They are attracted to the color red.

• In flight, their wings move so rapidly that they are a blur. When hovering, their wings beat 55 times a second. When they are backing up, their wings beat 61 times a second. When they are flying forward, their wings beat 75 times a second.

• Ruby-throated hummingbirds have the least number of feathers of any bird. They have a total of 940 feathers.

• Ruby-throated Hummingbirds are basically metallic green in color above, with gray below. The adult male has a slightly forked tail. He has feathers on his throat that may appear to be black but they flash red or orange in the sunlight, thus giving the bird its name. Females have white throats. Their tails are not forked and have white spots on the corners. Young birds resemble the females.  
• At night, hummingbirds enter a state known as 'torpor'. They lower their body temperatures and heart rates to conserve energy. In the morning, it will take a hummingbird a half-hour or so to come out of its torpor.
• The hummingbird is the smallest bird in the animal kingdom.
• Of all birds, hummingbirds lay the smallest eggs. A hummingbird's egg is less than half an inch long-half the size of a jellybean.
• If the average human were to consume as much food as a hummingbird, he or she would have to eat 103 kilograms (228 pounds) daily!
• Their heart rates are 615 beats per minute.
• They have been clocked flying at speeds up to 80-100 km per hour (50 - 60 miles per hour.)
• The extremely short legs of the Ruby-throated Hummingbird prevent it from walking or hopping. The best it can do is shuffle along a perch. Nevertheless, it scratches its head and neck by raising its foot up and over its wing.
• Hummingbirds are the only birds able to fly backwards.
• Hummingbirds often eat their own weight in food each day.
• Legend has it even Christopher Columbus was astonished at the site of these brilliant birds as he wrote in his journal about “little birds...so different from ours it is a marvel.” Because of this beauty and their tiny size “hummers” have figured prominently in myths and legends. One such myth is the idea that hummingbirds must “hitchhike” on the back of migrating geese to make the long journey across the Gulf of Mexico.
• A ruby-throated hummingbird weighs 3 grams, or one tenth the weight of a first class letter.

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  Art and Poetry
   

  Hummingbirds          You eat nectar, you fly so fast. In a race you won't be last. You go backwards growing plants. You won't ever eat ants. So we can't hear your word, we will always love you Hummingbird.

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  Cool Sites

  Cool Web Sites about Hummingbirds

  http://birds.cornell.edu/birdsofna/excerpts/rth.html

  http://www.mbr-pwrc.usgs.gov/id/framlst/i4280id.html

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  Works Cited

  Naumann, Harris. "\"Archilochus colubris\" (On-line)." 2000. Animal Diversity Web. 11 Feb 2004. <>.

  Craighead, Todd. "Ruby-throated Hummingbird." Department of Wildlife Conservation. 11 Feb 2004. <>.

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