Beautiful Sunbird (Cinnyris pulchellus) Fact Sheet: Diet & Feeding

Nectar (Cheke et al. 2001; Cheke and Mann 2008, except as noted)

• Small flowers are most important food source
• Visit flowers of more than 20 plant genera (Fry et al. 2000; Dowsett-Lemaire and Dowsett 2014)
• Acacia (Leguminosae)
• Aloe (Liliaceae) (see Visiting Flowers, right)
• Jacaranda (Bignoniaceae)
• Lantana (Verbenaceae)
• Tapinanthus (Loranthaceae)
• Unable to store nectar [sunbirds, general]
• No crop below esophagus (unlike hummingbirds)
• Need to feed frequently

Arthropods (insects and spiders)

• Flies, butterflies, and their larvae (Elphick 2014)
• Insects attracted to the jujube tree, Ziziphus mauritiana (Cheke et al. 2001)
• Termites (frequency in diet unclear) (Dial and Vaughan 1987)
• Small spiders (Araneae) (Cheke et al. 2001; Cheke and Mann 2008)

Fruits and berries

• Fleshy parts taken occasionally (Dowsett-Lemaire and Dowsett 2014; Elphick 2014; Winkler et al. 2015)
• E.g., neem, Azadirachta indica

Foraging

• Singly; occasionally in small groups (Cheke and Mann 2008)
• Spend much of their day searching for blooming plants (Elphick 2014)
• Make regular circuits of plants within their territories
• In and around foliage at edges of trees (Fry et al. 2000; Cheke and Mann 2008)
• Often low down, within 1 m of the ground
• Forest edges and clearings may be more productive in terms of flowering plants
• More reliable source of nectar or invertebrates
• Steady energy intake important to meet metabolic needs (Purchase et al. 2013)
• Where sunbird species overlap, some may reduce competition with each other by feeding at different plants (Riegert et al. 2011)

Access to nectar (Cheke and Mann 2008; Elphick 2014; except as noted)

• Approach to flowers
• Perch on branches
• Hang from flowers
• Hover in front of flowers
• Probe downwards or sideways, inserting bill into flower
• Forage at open and closed flowers
• Use bill to pry petals apart, tear petals, or pierce the base of flower to access nectar (“nectar-robbing”)
• See Stealing Nectar, right
• At times, may appear to put entire head inside flower
• Extract nectar by sucking with their tubular tongue (hummingbirds lick nectar)
• Tongue’s movement inside the mouth creates a slight vacuum
• Draws nectar up the tongue
• Often wipe bill on branch or twig afterwards [sunbirds, general]
• Factors influencing food intake
• Nectar viscosity and sugar concentration [White-bellied Sunbird] (Köhler et al. 2008; Köhler et al. 2010)
• Energy intake during previous meal [White-bellied Sunbird] (Bailey and Nicolson 2016)

Catching insects and spiders

• Glean from flowers or leaves, sometimes while hovering (Cheke and Mann 2008; Elphick 2014)
• ‘Hawking’ them in the air (Elphick 2014)
• Snatch from spiders’ webs (Elphick 2014)
• From windows or eaves of houses (Cheke and Mann 2008)

Sunbirds as pollinators

• Become dusted with pollen when insert head into flowers [sunbirds, general] (Cheke and Mann 2008)
• Carry pollen from flower-to-flower
• Deposit pollen on the recipient plant’s stigma
• Fertilize the plant
• However, limited evidence for highly specialized co-evolution between particular species of sunbirds and particular flowering plants [sunbirds, general] (Cheke and Mann 2008; Janeček et al. 2015)
• Some plants may have specially adapted flowers (Bartos et al. 2014)
• Some sunbird species pollinate plants of economic importance [sunbirds, general] (Cheke and Mann 2008)
• Also contribute to spread of parasitic plants
• Parasitic mistletoes [sunbirds, general] (Cheke and Mann 2008)
• Root parasites, e.g., Cytinus [sunbirds, general] (Hobbhahn and Johnson 2015)
• Some of these sunbird species regarded as pests (Cheke and Mann 2008)

A Beautiful Sunbird, Cinnyris pulchellus, perched on the stem of an aloe plant.

Both nectar and arthropods are important parts of a sunbird's diet.

Image credit: © Philippe Boissel at Flickr. All rights reserved. Used with permission from the artist.

Image details: Taken 07 February 2012 in Senegal.

A Beautiful Sunbird, Cinnyris pulchellus, pierces the base of a flower using its sharp, pointed bill.

A "nectar robbing" sunbird bypasses the usual "agreement" between flower and pollinator by "stealing" nectar from the base of the flower without touching the pollination structures.

Image credit: © Isidro Vila Verde at Flickr. All rights reserved. Used with permission from the artist.

Image details: 01 August 2007, Gambia.