Bahama Woodstar Hummingbirds (Calliphlox evelynae): Florida Vagrants, Lucayan Archipelago Natives

Beauty, behavior, and biogeography assure viewers that a hummingbird is a Bahama woodstar. The Lucayan natives claim:

• Adult head-and-body lengths of 3 – 4 inches (7.62 - 10.16 centimeters), weights of 0.09 – 0.20 ounces (2.55 – 5.67 grams), and wingspans of 3.94 – 5.12 inches (10 – 13 centimeters);
• Band- or bar-patterned breasts;
• Buff-olive under-sides;
• Dark and orange-brown tails;
• Dark eyes;
• Decurved, grey, needle-like bills;
• Green crowns, foreheads, napes, and upper-sides;
• Grey legs;
• Grey, pointed wings;
• Solid-patterned backs, bellies, and tails;
• Vocalizations of prítitidee, prítitidee, prítitidee;
• White eye-rings.

Along with dark green juveniles, dull-colored, round-tailed females display grey-white throats. The more iridescent males exhibit:

• Forked tails;
• Purple gorgets during year-round breeding seasons;
• White breast-bands.

Females and males may have pink-tinged foreheads.

Flying, hovering, humming, nectaring, nest-building, perching, pest-controlling, pollen-dispersing, seed-scattering, socializing, temperature-adjusting, and territorializing appear on the list of Bahama woodstar hummingbird behaviors. It befits them to:

• Balance on clothes lines, exposed twigs, and telephone wires;
• Drink from bird baths, sprinkler systems, and water fountains by catching falling drops while hovering or by drinking pour-overs while standing on rims;
• Fly backward, forward, and upside-down;
• Hover over a location by flapping wings 12 – 80 times per second;
• Move sideways through the air;
• Produce bee-like sounds simply by beating their wings.

Bahama woodstars consume:

• Garden water;
• Granulated sugar-water;
• Insects;
• Nectar;
• Pollen;
• Spiders.

They function as obligate pollinators and sowers by dispersing pollen and seeds while moving from flower to flower.

Temperature-control and territory-sweeps emerge as two unexpected accomplishments of diminutive, elusive Bahama woodstars. Both behaviors ensure individual survival and population sustainability within the serial territories demarcated, inhabited, and maintained by loose communities of Bahama woodstar single adults and parents. Like all other hummingbird species, Bahama woodstars find torpor an option when confronted with:

• Dwindling resources;
• Expanding populations;
• Increasing competition;
• Plummeting temperatures;
• Severe weather.

They lower their metabolic rates to as much as one-fifteenth the normal by:

• Dropping body temperatures;
• Slowing heartbeats and respirations.

They manage the reverse and surface from their hideaways once events pass, resources revive, and temperatures rise. Maintaining torpor as a viable response to environmental stress may be one of the motivations for territory-sweeps.

Territory-sweeps defend nectaring, sheltering, and socializing sites. They demand unexpected aggression from reclusive Bahama woodstar hummingbirds. Hummingbirds find themselves holding the world’s smallest living bird title thanks to bee hummingbirds (Mellisuga helenae) of:

• Cuba;
• Cuba’s Isla de la Juventud (“Isle of Youth”).

They have as their largest members, giant hummingbirds (Patagona gigas), of:

• Argentina;
• Bolivia;
• Chile;
• Colombia;
• Ecuador;
• Peru.

The comparison in size is the following:

• Maximum adult length of 8.47 inches (21.5 centimeters) and weight of 0.85 ounces (24 grams) for giant hummingbirds;
• Minimum adult length of 1.97 inches (5 centimeters) and weight of 0.06 ounces (1.6 grams) for bee hummingbirds.

Bahama woodstars mature to twice a bee hummingbird’s size and one-third that of giant hummingbirds.

Socialization among otherwise solitary Bahama woodstars assumes two forms:

• Feeding within super-lush clusters of host plants;
• Mating year-round, but with peak times in April.

Breeding often coincides with the end of heavy rains. Ample precipitation encourages lush flushes from flowering plants. Bahama woodstars gather together to catch insects and sip nectars. Shortly thereafter, females typically must:

• Build -- in tree forks or on thin horizontal branches 2 – 12 feet (0.61 – 3.66 meters) above ground -- animal hair-lined cup-like nests -- 1 inch (2.54 centimeters) in diameter -- from bark bits, plant fibers, and spider webs;
• Incubate 2 white eggs 15 – 18 days;
• Regurgitate into offspring’s throats and stomachs;
• Release offspring to independent lives 20 days after birth.

Forests and woodlands historically accommodate Bahama woodstar life cycles and natural histories. But agro-industrialism activates expansions into:

• Brushlands;

• Scrublands;

• Suburbs;

• Undergrowth.

With two exceptions, Bahama woodstars sustainably adapt to expanding urban and shrinking wildland interfaces within the archipelago's uniform geography and meteology. Firstly, the nominate (“first-named”) subspecies, Calliphlox evelynae evelynae (“Evelyn's beautiful flame,” categorized by Jules Bourcier [February 20, 1797 – March 10, 1873] in 1847 and honoring John Evelyn [October 31, 1620 - February 27, 1706]), claims all Lucayan niches but Inagua's. The subspecies lyrura ("Evelyn's beautiful flame [with] lyre-shaped tail," classified by John Gould [September 14, 1804 – February 3, 1881] in 1869) exclusively inhabits Inagua. Secondly, both subspecies may become northerly vagrants during extreme weather.

Bahama woodstars are strong enough to:

• Out-compete bumblebees (Bombus spp) and hawk moths (Sphingidae family);

• Survive hurricanes.

Gales change them from endemics of the Lucayan archipelago into vagrants from Florida to Pennsylvania. Strays crave:

• Arboreal shelters in palm-top (Sabal palmetto) and silk-cotton (Ceiba pentandra) trees;

• Arthropods, nectar, and pollen of Jacaranda caerulea, sage (Lantana camara, Salvia coccinea), swamp-bush (Pavonia bahamensis), vervain (Stachytarpheta jamaicensis), and yellow elder (Tecoma stans);

• 8 sunny hours on 310 days yearly;

• 80 – 90°F (27 – 32°C) in summer and 70 – 80°F (21 – 27°C) in winter;

• May to October rainfalls;

• 65% relative humidity.

Approximating the above-mentioned configurations turn vagrancies into happy, healthy residencies.

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Calliphlox evelynae map: Cephas, CC BY SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://eu.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fitxategi:Calliphlox_evelynae_map.svg

Bahama woodstar (Calliphlox evelynae), under synonyms of Thaumastura evelinae (List of Plates) and Calothorax evelynae (Plate, Text)
two males (left; lower right) with one female (top right); illustration by John Gould (September 14, 1804 – February 3, 1881)
John Gould, A monograph of the Trochilidae, or family of humming-birds, vol. III (1861), Plate 156: Not in copyright, via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/monographTrochi3Goul/page/n167/mode/1up

Dunmore Town, North Eleuthera, Bahamas: New Jersey Birds, CC BY SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bahama_Woodstar_(Calliphlox_evelynae).jpg

Bee hummingbird (Mellisuga helenae), under synonym of Calypta helenae
E. Mulsant et Édouard Verreaux, Histoire naturelle des oiseaux-mouches, Supplement (1874), Plate VII: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Histoirenaturell00muls_0021.jpg

Giant hummingbird (Patagona gigas)
Andean range, along western South American continent from Colombia southward to Chile: Arturo Nahum, CC BY SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons@ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Patagona_gigas.jpg

Loggerhead kingfisher (Tyrannus caudifasciatus)
Camagüey Province, Cuba: Laura Gooch, CC BY SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Tyrannus_caudifasciatus_-Camaguey_Province,_Cuba-8_(2).jpg

Bahama woodstar subspecies, Lyre-shaped woodstar (Calliphlox evelynae lyrura), under synonym Doricha lyrura
John Gould, A monograph of the Trochilidae, or family of humming-birds, Supplement (1887), Plate 34: Not in copyright, via Internet Archive @ https://archive.org/details/monographTrochiSupplementGoul/page/n173/mode/1up

Bucher's Mill Covered Bridge
Denver, Lancaster County, southeastern Pennsylvania: Derek Ramsey (Ram-Man), CC BY SA 2.5, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bucher's_Mill_Covered_Bridge_Full_Side_3008px.jpg

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Female Bahama Woodstar (Calliphlox evelynae)
Nicholls Town, North Andros, Bahamas: Matt MacGillivray from Toronto, Canada, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Calliphlox_evelynae_(female).jpg

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