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Broad-tailed Hummingbird

This female Broad-tailed Hummingbird was flying in a friend’s yard that was filled with dozens of different types of flowers. We were at about 8000 ft above sea level, which these little birds prefer in summer since it’s cooler at high altitude. I love her flight pose and her golden colors.

From Cornell: “Broad-tailed Hummingbirds zip from flower to flower, hovering above flowers to drink nectar…. They breed in high-elevation meadows, shrubby habitats near pine-oak and evergreen forests, and forest openings within pinyon-juniper, oak woodlands, and evergreen forests in the western United States…. The Broad-tailed Hummingbird is one tough hummingbird. Even on summer nights, cold air often descends into mountain valleys, dropping temperatures to below freezing. The nesting female copes with these temperature extremes by building a well-insulated nest and entering torpor, but the male often heads upslope, out of the pocket of cold air that collected in the valley. This move can reduce his energy costs of thermoregulation by about 15%.”

This photo was taken on July 8th, 2017, in the evening.