Lucifer Hummingbird

The lucifer sheartail is a medium-sized, 10-centimetre (3.9 in) long, green hummingbird with a long curved bill, small wings, and white streak behind its eye. The male has an iridescent plumage, forked dark tail, green crown, long magenta gorget, and white underparts. The female is larger with duller plumage, pale throat and white or buff feathers underside, usually with crimson trim.

The lucifer sheartail is distributed to deserts and arid areas with agave plants in the southwestern United States, from southwest Texas, extreme southwestern New Mexico to southeastern Arizona, and in central and northern Mexico. It is also found in the Madrean sky islands of the northern end of the Sierra Madre Occidental, Mexico. Its preferred habitat tends to be at altitudes of 3,500–5,500 feet (1,100–1,700 m) in canyons, mountain slopes, and dry washes having desert shrubs and cacti. In winter, the birds migrate to central Mexico.

The diet consists mainly of nectar from agave and colorful desert flowers, spiders and small insects. Lucifer sheartails have a typical hummingbird flight style while feeding from flowers, catching insects in flight, and flying in straight lines to specific destinations for other food, the nest or for roosting. Males defend feeding areas from males, other females, and black-chinned hummingbirds. However, most C. lucifer are non-territorial and forage at undefended agave or agave surrounded by dense vegetation.