Secret life of hummingbird revealed

Hummingbirds are giving up some of their secrets.

The perfecting of placing tiny numbered bands on their legs in the last decade has led researchers to discover hummingbirds can live longer than 10 years as opposed to the two or three once thought likely.

Astonishing migrations have been found, with a Rufous hummingbird caught in Florida one winter showing up the following summer more than 5,630km away in southeast Alaska. Some birds have even been discovered wintering in areas where temperatures drop below minus 18 degrees Celsius.

"We're learning a lot about hummingbirds through banding we never would have learned otherwise," said Bruce Peterjohn, chief of the bird banding laboratory for the US Geological Survey's Patuxent Wildlife Research Centre in Laurel, Maryland.

Federal and state permits are required to capture the birds, which are protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

In the United States, Peterjohn said, there are some 225 hummingbird banders. About 125 are considered masters, and another 100 banders trained by them have sub-permits, though they are allowed to capture hummingbirds unsupervised.