286 REPOKT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1890. 



It is popularly supposed that Humming Birds feed entirely on nectar 

 obtained from flowers, but it lias long been known that insects form a 

 portion of their food. This fact was established as long ago as 1804, 

 by Dr. B. S. Barton, in an article in Barton's Medical and Physical 

 Journal, part i, vol. I. pp. 88, 89. The evidence is somewhat conflicting 

 as to whether insects or honey preponderate in the Humming Bird's 

 bill of fare, but very probably the relative proportions of the two kinds 

 of food vary under different circumstances. One observer (Mr. Manly 

 Hardy, in The Auk, July, 1887, p. 255) asserts that they " sometimes 

 feed the young on insects within 24 hours from the time they are 

 hatched." 



A young bird, about 2 days old, of the Ruby- throat ( Trochilus colubris), 

 taken by Mr. Edwin H. Eames, of Bridgeport, Connecticut, appears to 

 have been fed exclusively on young spiders. He says : 



Its throat being much distended, I sought the cause by lightly pressing with a dull 

 instrument from the thorax toward the bill, and succeeded in bringing to light 16 

 young spiders of uniform size. These measured about 0.11 of an inch in length, and 

 with outspread legs covered a circle of 0.26 of an inch in diameter. Dissection 

 revealed a priltaceous mass of the same in the stomach, but no more liquid tban 

 would result during digestion of insects of this gelatinous character. They were all 

 of the same species, aud may have been young found about certain plants in the im- 

 mediate vicinity. It is surprising that young Humming Birds of this age could 

 thrive, as it would seem, entirely upon insects, although the quality be of the finest. 

 (The Auk, July, 1890, p. 287.) 



Mr. A. B. Wallace even goes so far as to state his belief that insects 

 form the principal food of Humming Birds. He says : * 



The great number of species that frequent flowers, do so, I am convinced, for the 

 small insects found there, and not for the nectar. In dozens, and perhaps hundreds, 

 of common flower-frequenting species which I have examined, the crop, stomach, 

 and intestines have been entirely filled with minute beetles, bees, ants, and spiders, 

 which abound in most flowers in South America. Very rarely, indeed, have I found 

 a trace of honey or of any liquid in the crop or stomach. The flowers they most fre- 

 quent are the various species of Inga, aud the papilionaceous flowers of many large 

 forest trees. I have never seen them at the Bignonias or any flowers but those which 

 grow in large masses, covering a whole tree or shrub, as they visit perhaps a hun- 

 dred flowers in a minute, and never stop at a single one. The little Emerald Hum- 

 mer I have seen in gardens and at the common orange Jsclepias, which often covers 

 large spaces of waste ground in the tropics. But there are many, such as Phaethornia 

 eremita, and some larger allied species, which I have never seen at flowers. These 

 inhabit the gloomy forest shades, where they dart about among the foliage, and I 

 have distinctly observed them visit, in rapid succession, every leaf on a branch, 

 balancing themselves vertically in the air, passing their beak closely over the under 

 surface of each leaf, and thus capturing, no doubt, any small insects that may be 

 upon them. While doing this the two long feathers of their tail have a vibrating 

 motion, serving apparently as a rudder to assist them in performing the delicate 

 operation. I have seen others searching up and down stems and dead sticks in the 

 same manner, every now and then picking otf something, exactly as a Bush-Shrike or 

 a Tree-creeper does, with the exception, that the Humming Bird is constantly on the 

 wing. They also capture insects in the true Fissirostral mauner. How often may 

 they be seen perched on the dead twig of a lofty tree, the same station that is chosen 

 by the Tyrant Flycatchers and the Jacamars, and from which, like those birds, they 



