HUMMINGBIRD SPECIES

Volcano Hummingbird

SCIENTIFIC NAME: Selasphorus flammula

The Volcano Hummingbird is a very small hummingbird species.

It is tiny, measuring only 2.95 inches long. Males weigh 2.5 grams and females 2.8 grams. Bill is black, short and straight.

Adult males have bronze-green upperparts and rufous-edged black outer tail feathers.

Throat is gray-purple in the Talamanca range, red in the Poas-Barva mountains and pink-purple in the Irazú-Turrialba area, the rest of the underparts being white.

Females are similar to the males, but their throat is white with dusky spots.

Young birds resemble the females but have buff fringes to the upperpart plumage

Call of this rather quiet species is a whistled "teeeeuu".

Nectar, taken from a variety of small flowers, including Salvia and Fuchsia, and species normally pollinated by insects. It also takes some small insects as an essential source of protein.

Inhabits open brushy areas, paramo, and edges of elfin forest at altitudes from 1850 meters to the highest peaks.

Native to the Talamancan montane forests of Costa Rica and western Panama.

The female is entirely responsible for nest building and incubation. She builds a tiny plant-down cup nest, 1 - 5 meters high in a scrub or on a root below a south or east facing bank.

She lays 2 white eggs and incubates for about 15 – 19 days, and fledging another 20 – 26 days.

SOURCE:
https://en.wikipedia.org