Side by side, how the humble hummingbird flies faster than a fighter jet

Mail Online ^ | 11 June 2009 | Sophie Borland

[GSP.FAN]

It may be just four inches long - but the tiny hummingbird flies faster than a space shuttle and a fighter jet. Scientists have discovered that the animal performs the quickest aerial manoeuvre in the natural world compared to its size.

Researchers from the University of California, Berkeley found that the courtship dive of Anna's hummingbird is 58 mph making it the fastest animal on earth

[GSP.FAN]

My Pics

[GSP.FAN]

[Pelham]

Great pics.

[Grammy]

Hummingbird ping!

Come see GSP.FAN’s hummer pictures.

[DennisR]

58mph? Not even close to the peregrine falcon - 200mph in a dive.

[NCC-1701]

Talking about the space shuttle, wouldn’t it be interesting to see how well a hummingbird would fly in zero-g?

[LucyJo]

Wow! Thanks for the ping. That is awesome info about the hummingbird, and I love the pics.

I was interested about the Anna's hummingbird 'singing' with its tail.

Here is an article about that:

Anna's Hummingbird Chirps With Its Tail During Display Dives

This from another story about the dive:

As they come out of their dive, they emit a short "chirping" sound which was recently shown by Dr Clark to come from its tail feathers rather than a "song box" in its throat. It does this by exploiting the noise generated as air rushed through the vanes of its tail feathers at the end of a dive, similar to the sound produced by air moving over the vibrating reed of a clarinet. "This is a new mechanism for sound production in birds," Dr Clark said.

[PGalt]

Great pics! Name/title courtesy ping.

[LucyJo]

Hubby was just telling me that hummingbirds are among a small number of birds that can’t walk. They surely make up for it in flying.

[zeebee]

[My hearts in London - Everett]

Oh, but can the falcon fly backwards? :~)

[patton]

Yes, with a good headwind.

I landed a Cessna that way once ... sort of freaked the passengers out.

“Can you shut off the engine, now? I would like to get out.”

“Uh, no.”

[GSP.FAN]

Excellent pics,i just took this pic last week..

[LucyJo]

Oooh...gorgeous.

[SWAMPSNIPER]

Fine shots!

I love to watch them show off for each other, they pull off some amazing stunts.

[GSP.FAN]

Thank you sitting in the backyard for 2hrs waiting to take a pic is so relaxing.
Posting the pic so everyone can enjoy it is a added bonus.

[My hearts in London - Everett]

Thanks for the pics, gsp.fan! I collect hummingbird items and I have an album of hummer pics on my FB page. I love hummingbirds. :~)

[GSP.FAN]

Very protective my hummingbirds are,we have one guy who spends his whole day protecting the feeders,females welcome no males allowed.

[LucyJo]

Sounds wonderful. Hummingbirds are fascinating to me. The beautiful pics are much appreciated.

[DennisR]

Uh...probably not. :)

[Apercu]

Your are right about the peregrine’s outright speed alone - however, relative to it's body size & length, the hummingbird is indeed the fastest and absolutely fearless. I have seen them go after larger birds & squirrels near their staked out territory with a vengeance. There is an excellent graphic demonstrating the relative speed comparison in the article on the link.

[dennisw]

 

Grammy took these photos a few days ago of the mother hummingbird feeding her hatchlings.
The nest is is her backyard, 30 feet off the ground up in a tree

 

 

[dennisw]

Very nice photos!

[Grammy]

Thanks dennisw for posting these for me. Mr G is the photographer in the family. I just found the nest.
8-)

We had a big storm go through here yesterday. The babies are too big for momma to really sit on the nest now, so she clung on to the edge and spread her wings to protect the babies from the wind and rain. It was really something to watch.

[Grammy]

Very nice pictures zeebee.

[dennisw]

It’s hard to get photos of hummingbird nests if they usually build then 30 ft off the ground

Do you have a feeder and some plants that they go to in your garden?

[US Navy Vet]

Isn’t it amazing what 5/9/10 Billion years can do for you.

[DennisR]

They are amazing little creatures...

[Grammy]

Talking about the space shuttle, wouldn’t it be interesting to see how well a hummingbird would fly in zero-g?"

LOL. How could you tell any difference?

[Grammy]

Our house is built on a steep slope and our property is heavily wooded. The front door is at ground level, and so is the basement door in the back. That means our 2nd story is actually 3 stories high in the back of the house. It is kind of like living in a tree house.

8-)

The nest is even with the windows on the back of our 2nd story.... about 30 feet high.

The hummer feeder is on our front porch. We don’t have a lot of flowers, since we are in deep shade most of the time. Our hostas used to bloom pretty well, but the deer think that I planted them a salad bar, so no flowers this year.

We have kept tabs on momma hummer, and she leaves the nest for up to an hour. At one point she spent a lot of time sitting near the feeder just primping and eating. I think she is getting other food for her chicks.

One year during a drought we had about 20 hummers surrounding a 1 quart feeder. They didn’t even bother fighting to defend the feeder, just waited for their turn. They would empty the feeder every day.

[Joe 6-pack]

The study in question examines speed relative to traveling it's own body length...and indeed provides a chart including a comparison with the peregrine...

[WOBBLY BOB]

and let’s see a hummingbird carry sidewinder missles!

[DennisR]

Bingo! I would take a falcon into a fight any day.

[tet68]

In zero G it wouldn’t take many wing flaps to maintain position or move. It would be an interesting experiment.