No Feet

Hummingbird foot, in bander's hand (photo by Kate St. John)
Leg and foot of ruby-throated hummingbird in bander’s hand (photo by Kate St. John, bander Bob Mulvihill)

2 September 2015

Here’s the leg of a ruby-throated hummingbird, so short that the toes make up nearly half its length.

Look closely and you’ll see the foot resembles a garden claw.

Garden claw tool (illustration from Clipartbest.com)
Garden claw (illustration from Clipartbest.com)

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This group of birds also has tiny feet shaped like garden claws.

White-throated swifts (Crossley ID Guide for Eastern Birds via Wikimedia Commons)
White-throated swifts (Crossley ID Guide for Eastern Birds via Wikimedia Commons)

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Once you know their feet are similar, it’s not a big leap to realize that these birds are related.

Swifts (Apodidae) and hummingbirds (Trochilidae) are in the same the taxonomic order Apodiformes, a Greek word that means “A”=no, “pod”=foot.

“No feet.”  🙂

p.s. Click here to read more about the similarities between hummingbirds and swifts.

(hummingbird photo by Kate St. John, garden claw clip art from clipartbest.com, white-throated swifts illustration from the Crossley ID Guide for Eastern Birds, Creative Commons license, via Wikimedia Commons. Click on the images to see the originals)

3 thoughts on “No Feet

  1. I’ll never forget the comment in an email about 15 years ago from a guy from the Philly area who went down to Montrose WV to Gerry’s HummerHaven and said “I saw their feet, they do have feet!”

  2. Well, they PERCH (for a few seconds, anyway!) so they must have SOME sort of tootsies down there!
    I was watching a hummingbird in the back yard today, and she definitely perched a few times in between feedings.

  3. I have one that frequents my feeder that I swear has NO feet. It’s constantly fluttering while drinking and there are no feet for it to perch! It’s the only one like that. All other perch and stay for awhile and drink. ????

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