The group's data from the peak of migration (for Anna's, Black-chinned, and Rufous hummingbirds) will be pooled with that of similar HMN groups working across the southeastern Arizona sky island region, California, Utah, Idaho, New Mexico, Colorado, British Columbia and Mexico City.

With the collected HMN data combined with remote sensing and other biological data, Wethington will work with a team of scientists led by ecologist Catherine Graham of Stony Brook University to study how the hummingbirds might adapt to the changing climate. A NASA grant supports the research as part of the agency's project to investigate how wildlife and ecosystems will respond to climate change.

With the Earth's rapidly changing climate, Wethington fears hummingbirds will face ever-greater challenges. In June, for example, biologists David Inouye and Amy McKinney of the University of Maryland and their colleagues reported in Ecology that glacier lilies were blooming earlier in the spring, at a time out of sync with the arrival of Broad-tailed hummingbirds traveling north.

"One of our biggest concerns is the changing phenology of the flowers that they visit to the timing of their arrival," Wethington says. Broad-tailed hummingbirds are expected to be among the most heavily affected species because they require high-mountain forest breeding sites to nest and raise their young.

So far, the Broad-tailed hummingbirds have proved resilient. Consider what they went through in the winter of 2010 to 2011, when freezing temperatures stretched as far south as Jalisco, Mexico. The following spring HMN researchers recorded a greater number of Broad-taileds at low- and mid-level elevations during migration. They noticed that the birds that made it through the cold survived by delaying their molting and changing the location of their stopover sites to lower elevations.

"The fact that they can do that is interesting," Wethington says.

Also interesting, she adds, is the role of fire as a land-management tool. Wildfire can be tragic to hummingbirds, as it is for any other species, but it can also help open up an area, return organic material to the soil, and stimulate the production of flowers—as it has this year—leading to rebounding populations.

Future projects are planned to help foresee how hummingbirds adapt to extreme weather patterns and to help inform conservation efforts, such as habitat restoration and enhancement, as well as public land management.

Wethington encourages more people to become involved. "It's a huge commitment. We wouldn't have ever gotten started without volunteers and citizen scientists."

»View the Hummingbirds Slide Show

4 Comments

1. 1. Charles Hollahan 01:23 PM 10/18/12

   Driving past the Chiricahua Mountains in late August can be very surprising. There's an overlook a few miles out from the area just before getting back into the salt pan again and the view is stunning because of the moisture and life. This off Interstate 10, a highway the goes from the beach in Santa Monica to the other side of the continent.
   
   The Chiricahua Mountains themselves are too far away from the road to appreciate and I've never been able to get off and see them. It was near Cochise's last stronghold according to some of the road signs about 50 miles away.
   
   I've read a lot of comments by people who are now calling the changes in weather and the science of understanding the changes a "religion for global warming", usually on the pages of newspaper blogs. The parties don't seem to understand that it's no longer theoretical.
   
   It's nice to hear that Hummingbirds are evolving at least. The Chiricahua Mountains are a very small oasis out in the middle of the desert. If it fades away, as it did in the past, then it might take human intervention to keep their routes open until we find a solution to the fossil carbon energy economy.

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2. 2. Travashamockery 03:30 PM 10/18/12

   I'm expecting the usual SA climate change nay-sayers to be commenting on this innocuous little article any minute now....

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3. 3. pooka47401 10:48 AM 10/19/12

   I have noticed over the past couple of years,that there have been vastly more female than male hummers hatched. I usually end up feeding 20-30 on a regular basis, during the Southern Indiana Summer.This was true last year and this year. I had about 1 male to 5 female ratio. It reminded me that women have more male children when enduring War and more females in Peace time. If Hummers were under stress then it would make sense to have more females to breed, to replace those lost.

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4. 4. greenhome123 12:53 AM 10/23/12

   I have noticed that many people are concerned about pesticides hurting bee populations, but I haven't heard anything about pesticides hurting hummingbirds. I think that is an issue that needs more study, since hummingbirds are also important pollinators.

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