The Calliope Hummingbird is the tiniest breeding bird in North America, measuring just 3–3.5 inches long. In Arizona, it’s a summer resident—arriving in April and departing by August—favoring montane oak woodlands, pine–fir forests and riparian canyons at elevations between about 4,000 and 8,500 feet. It’s most often encountered in southeastern Arizona’s Sky Islands, where it darts among small wildflowers and backyard feeders, with the iridescent magenta stripes on its throat patch flashing in the sun. A long-distance migrant, the Calliope winters in Mexico before returning north each spring.
