A hummingbird species feeds almost exclusively on the nectar of Heliconia flower

Question

A hummingbird species feeds almost exclusively on the nectar of Heliconia flowers. Each hummer has a circuit that takes it from one plant to another, with the bird showing up regularly at a given flower after a set period. It could be 30 minutes more or less to do the roundtrip.

a. In one sentence, explain why this statement could be wrong: “The bird is behaving optimally because it is getting more energy than it is expending on the foraging trips.”

b. I want to collect information in order to determine if the bird is really foraging optimally in an energy gathering sense. What aspects of its foraging behaviour would I need to know and measure in order to calculate the net caloric gain for the foraging hummer?

c. Hummingbirds have been observed to hesitate before inserting their beaks into heliconia flowers to feed. How might this hesitation still be consistent with an optimal foraging hypothesis?

Explanation / Answer

Part-a: The given statement is wrong according optimal foraging theory, because, any animal species is going to spend more metabolic energy expenses for foraging to gather food compared to "net energy obtained from the consumed food" eventually leading to lose weight finally perish. Therefore, in the above case, humming bird should get more energy (calories) from the consumed food compared to energy takes for a circuit that takes it from one plant to another to find food.

Part-b: Yes, the humming bird is really foraging optimally in an energy gathering sense. It is crucial to known the "cumulative resource intake & time foraging in patch" when going for capturing prey. Therefore, it is essential to know the energy cost (E) per time during animal foraging to calculate "maximizing net rate of energy gain" as per traveling time results in larger optimum load.

Part-C: Hummingbirds have been observed to hesitate before inserting their beaks into heliconia flowers to feed. . Foraging following the optimal foraging model & increases fitness due to optimum foraging of the animal & it is still be consistent with an optimal foraging hypothesis because animal always wish to benefit more energy with low cost of forgaing to attain higher fitness. Foraging for food that provides too little energy for required to eat it: decreases fitness due to severe depletion of energy levels for metabolic activity so that behavioral aspects are minimized.

A humming bird has a very specialized beak that allows extracting the nectar from flowers. The benefits does these specialized beak provide are "dip and sip action" through capillary action to extract nectar deep from the flowers. This is due to presence of "hyoid apparatus with cartilaginous structures" that help beaks to extract the nectar into their throat. The natural selection is the potential consequences if your food source disappeared through a natural catastrophe from the flowers because "natural selection" operates to acquire adaptations to increase beak length and width to catch some insects other than "nectar from flower". This is due to environmental factors in humming bird to acquire "strong beak" as an evolutionary adaptation i.e. best suited for the size and shape of any flower of any insect to catch

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