The Courtship Dive

The hummers have been back for a couple of weeks now. Most of the time it's been the Rufous Hummingbirds; just the other day we also had a Black-Chinned make an appearance. It's almost impossible to get a picture of these little guys, so I found one of a Rufous on World of Hummingbirds.com.

One of several interesting aspects of their behaviour is called the "courtship dive". The male will fly up about 60 feet or so and then plummit earthward, slamming on the air brakes at the bottom of the dive. There's a peculiar sound associated with the very end of the dive and, since they're traveling so fast, it's hard to tell exactly what's making it. It could be some type of vocalization or it could be from the feathers as they brake at the end of the dive. It sounds like a kind of chirpy squeak, kind of like the noise you'd get from a rubber duck toy that you might have used in the backtub (or perhaps still do). I've also seen the male flying rapidly back and forth in a horizontal line in front of a female sitting in a nearby tree.

I guess everyone has to make an impression somehow!