Nature is both fascinating yet cruel, at one moment a new life with hopes, dreams and aspirations begins it’s journey yet, on the other side of the coin is the morbid reality of death.

The same hits true for baby hummingbirds who may lose their life at the flick of button through something unplanned. As for why or how they lose their live, it may be down to a lack of nutrition resulting in them starving, extreme heat resulting in dehydration, being abandoned by their mother, a predator may find and eat them or it could be as a result of an unfortunate accident. 

This article will go into a little more detail on each reason so you’ll understand why a baby hummer could lose their lives as a result.

1. They Aren’t Provided Enough Nutrition

Food is massively important in a chicks early life, particularly protein from insects that will allow the baby hummingbirds to grow. They need to eat 2 – 3 times an hour to survive, which is a lot when you take into account the fledglings don’t even move or fly around until 3 weeks into their life.

It’s quite obvious that the lack of nutrition from the best sources will ultimately result in the infant chick passing away. There have been instances where the mother isn’t able to to pass enough Nectar or regurgitated insects around which may eventually result in a baby hummers demise.

As unfortunate as it is, this can happen.

Particularly in areas without enough food and where to some degree natural selection ultimately takes its course.

2. Their Mother Abandons Them

Hummingbird mothers put in a lot of time and effort in prepation for having a baby where they regularly migrates hundreds or in some cases thousand of miles to create them due to brooding season. They then attempt to find a suitable place to build a nest before putting a good amount of time into incubating the eggs and raising the baby hummers, we’re talking between 1 – 2 months worth of time in raising them.

That’s why a mother hummer truly abandoning their kin is a rare occurrence but, that doesn’t mean they don’t, especially when they have no choice but to do so.

These instances may include the nest itself not being in a safe area where they cannot survive if they remain so they abandon it. Another reason might be that they get injured when making their way out to get food and as a result are unable to make it back, maybe due to eating food that make them sick results in their untimely death etc.

A hummer baby getting abandoned is honestly extremely rare which is why only in the most extreme cases will a mother hummingbird up and leave.

3. Too Much Heat Or Too Cold

Too much of anything will eventually become bad therefore, extremely hot weather or a bitterly cold period can be the reason a baby hummingbird may reach their untimely end.

Dehydration, illness, heatstroke, sunburn and so on can negatively affect the little newborns health therefore, if the nest isn’t built in an environment away from the extreme cold or heat by the s, if a vet doesn’t intervene, the chances of the child making it through would be low.

Adult hummingbirds are obviously more resilient and capable of getting through both extremes but, infant hummers simply aren’t adapted enough to extreme heat or cold so, although a very unlikely reason for their death, it is still possible.

4. Preyed Upon

Bigger birds, rodents and even domestic animals like cats may prey on these little birds. This could be after the mother hummingbird has gone out to get some food or even by a larger animal that the mother is unable to fend off.

Newborn hummers cannot defend themselves, they don’t even learn to fly until the later part of their fledgling life. With the hummingbirds most proficient defensive action (flight) out of the equation, there’s literally nothing the babies would be capable of doing, they’d just have to succumb, yield and unwillingly accept their fate.

5. Through An Unfortunate Accident

It’s possible for the babies to die from an unfortunate accident too. This could involve someone else accidentally knocking the child over resulting in them falling and potentially dying as a result.

Maybe wind could knock them, some kind of forest fire, natural disasters like lightning or even extreme cold could result in their death.

Inexperienced people trying to nurture the babies back to health may accidentally feed them with the incorrect foods which may choke them,

Maybe holding them too aggressively unintentionally injuring, which is something that most people can’t normally fix resulting in yet another unfortunate accident. Other unlikely accidents may occur too and in a lot of those cases only an expert may be able to nurse these little newborns back, though even then it’s not always likely.

In the end of the day nature will run it’s course and there won’t be much we can do, after all natural selection is extremely prevalent in and to some degree it’s the reason why these little birds have evolved to the degree they have.

Summary

Newborns don’t often die, at least not as a result of negligent parenting from the mother hummer but, as is the case with anything in nature, it always possible for an animal to meet a sudden end, it even rings true for us as the reality is that tomorrow isn’t promised.

So baby hummingbirds dying through an accident, extreme weather conditions, through abandonment or the more likely case of being food of prey will always be a possibility, an unfortunate one but a possibility nonetheless.

References

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/1972430/why-would-a-hummingbird-abandon-her-nest

https://hummingbirdbliss.com/how-to-help-hummingbirds-in-hot-weather/