Hummingbird Habitat Frequency Use at Land of Ortego - Zalk
Brent & Sue Ortego, Shawn Ashbaugh, Susan Beree, Charlie & Olivia Brower, Brad Lirette, Robert & Kay Lookingbill, Sumita Prasad, Bron Rorex, Suzie Ross, Craig Zalk participated in banding.
We use the term habitat frequency in this report rather than preferences because preference is difficult to prove. There are many factors which affect whether a bird uses a particular habitat which includes its preference, availability of the habitat, size of the habitat, season of use, availability of food, competition for that habitat from other hummers and animals as well as individuals of its own species, predators, trapability, etc.
With all of these factors potentially influencing use we choose just to list frequency of use as determined by birds caught by mist-nets versus availability of habitat.
Land of Ortego - Zalk supports a relatively large wintering population of hummingbirds near the Central Gulf Coast of Texas. We have documented 367 BUFH hummer winters, 216 RUHU, 110 BCHU, 67 RTHU, 31 ALHU, 26 BTLH, 21 CAHU, 11 ANHU, 1 BBLH from 1995 thru 2006.
| Habitat | Willow | Live Oak | Mesquite | Brush |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Availability | 7 | 24 | 16 | 53 |
| BUFH | 8 | 30 | 19 | 43 |
| RUHU | 7 | 13 | 8 | 72 |
| BCHU | 10 | 21 | 33 | 36 |
| RTHU | 5 | 32 | 5 | 59 | ALHU | 13 | 0 | 0 | 87 |
| BTLH | 0 | 13 | 0 | 87 |
| CAHU | 8 | 0 | 8 | 84 |
Leave a Reply