Hummingbird Migration: When They Leave and Return

Hummingbird migration follows the flowers. Most US hummingbirds spend the winter in Mexico and Central America, come north in spring as blossoms and insects appear, and head south again between midsummer and fall. Exactly when depends on where you live and which species you have.

East of the Great Plains, that almost always means one bird: the Ruby-throated Hummingbird, which reaches the Gulf Coast from late February and the northern states by early to mid-May, then heads south from July (adult males first) through October. The West has several species, some of which travel enormous distances and a few of which hardly migrate at all.

When hummingbirds arrive and leave, by region

These are typical windows. Weather moves them by a week or two in either direction, and early and late birds turn up every year.

For a closer look at timing where you live, see when to put out hummingbird feeders and when to take down hummingbird feeders.

Ruby-throated Hummingbird: the eastern migrant

Ruby-throats spend the winter from southern Mexico to Central America, with small numbers in south Florida and along the Gulf Coast. In spring many of them cross the Gulf of Mexico in a single nonstop flight of about 500 miles, landing on the coast between Texas and Florida. Others take the land route around the western Gulf through Texas.

From the coast they move north at the pace of spring. Males lead, usually arriving a week or more before females, and claim territories around the best flowers and feeders. By mid-May they reach the northern states and southern Canada.

Fall migration starts sooner than most people expect. Adult males take no part in raising young, and they begin drifting south as early as July. Females follow in August and September, and the young of the year, which have never made the trip, often come last. That is why feeders can seem busiest in late August: local families and migrants from farther north are refueling at the same time.

Before crossing the Gulf, Ruby-throats put on a large amount of fat, in some cases nearly doubling their body weight. That fat is the fuel for the crossing.

Western hummingbirds and the Rufous loop

The West has more species and more variety in how they travel. The main types of hummingbirds each have their own pattern:

• Rufous Hummingbird: for its size, one of the longest migrations of any bird. Rufous fly north along the Pacific Coast from late winter into spring, nesting as far north as Alaska, then return south through the Rocky Mountains from July to September, feeding on mountain wildflowers. Most winter in Mexico, and a growing number winter along the Gulf Coast and in the Southeast.
• Calliope Hummingbird: the smallest bird that nests in the US, about 3 inches long. It takes a similar loop, north through the Pacific states and south through the Rockies.
• Broad-tailed Hummingbird: the common summer hummingbird of the Rockies, known for the male's metallic wing trill. It arrives in April and May and leaves by September.
• Black-chinned Hummingbird: the western counterpart of the Ruby-throat, nesting from Texas and the Southwest north into the interior West.
• Anna's Hummingbird: the exception. It stays all year along the Pacific Coast and in parts of the Southwest, getting through frosty nights by going into torpor.

Because of that loop, a Rocky Mountain feeder can suddenly fill with feisty orange Rufous Hummingbirds in July, weeks after they left the Pacific Northwest, while the local Broad-tails are still nesting.

What starts migration, and two myths

Hummingbirds do not wait for food to run out. Changing day length triggers the internal changes that make them fatten up and grow restless, and weather fine-tunes the timing. Food along the route matters, but the urge to go comes from within.

That answers the most common worry: leaving your feeder up in fall does not stop hummingbirds from migrating. Healthy birds leave on schedule. A feeder simply helps late migrants and young birds refuel on the way. The usual advice is to keep feeders up until about two weeks after you see your last hummingbird.

The second myth is that hummingbirds ride south on the backs of geese. They do not. Hummingbirds migrate alone, mostly by day, flying low and stopping often to feed, and they manage the whole trip on their own wings.

How to read a hummingbird migration map

Every spring, several websites publish hummingbird migration maps built from sightings that people report. Each dot is usually someone's first hummingbird of the year, so the dots creep north week by week, which makes the map a useful cue for when to hang your feeder.

Read them with a little caution:

• Dots show first sightings, not the main wave. The first bird in a county can be two or three weeks ahead of most of the others.
• Reports follow people. Cities and suburbs fill in fast, while rural areas can look empty even when birds are there.
• Species can be mixed together. Eastern maps are nearly all Ruby-throats, but in the West several species may be reported as one.
• Fall maps are thinner. People notice the first bird of spring far more than the last bird of fall.

The best use is local. When reports reach the next state or two to your south, it is time to put nectar out. For following other migrants the same way, see how to track bird migration.

How to help migrating hummingbirds

1. Put feeders out early. By late February or early March on the Gulf Coast, mid to late March across the rest of the South, early to mid-April in the central states, late April in the far north. Early arrivals find few flowers.
2. Keep nectar simple and fresh. Mix 1 part white sugar to 4 parts water, with no red dye, honey or other sweeteners. Change it every two days in hot weather and at least weekly in cool weather.
3. Leave feeders up through fall. Take them down about two weeks after your last sighting.
4. Plant a relay of flowers. Early bloomers such as red columbine and coral honeysuckle help spring migrants, and late ones such as salvias, cardinal flower and jewelweed help in fall.
5. Skip pesticides. Small insects are the protein hummingbirds need, especially young birds.
6. For Hummingbird Migration: When They Leave and Return, treat hazardous glass with a maintained exterior collision-prevention solution and inspect the actual flight path. Feeder distance alone is not a universal safety rule.

Sources and editorial verification

Editorial boundary for Hummingbird Migration: When They Leave and Return: Nectar, cleaning frequency, migration timing and feeder placement vary with weather, contamination and region; inspect conditions and use current guidance; Migration timing and abundance are probabilistic and location-specific; live forecasts and current regional data supersede fixed calendar dates. Check linked sources and the responsible local authority again before acting because product documentation, disease conditions, wildlife rules and seasonal observations can change.

• Smithsonian's National Zoo and Conservation Biology Institute — checked for one-part refined white sugar to four-parts water.
• US National Park Service — checked for nectar and insect diet.
• Cornell Lab of Ornithology — checked for species identification.
• Cornell Lab of Ornithology — checked for migration terminology.
• Cornell Lab of Ornithology eBird Science — checked for modeled seasonal abundance.
• Cornell Lab of Ornithology and Colorado State University — checked for nightly migration forecasts.

Written by the Backyard Birdcam team with AI assistance. Found something we got wrong? Email shop@smarternewsnow.com and we will fix it. How we write our guides.