
Have you seen one of these? Hummingbird Moth
Updated: Jan 3, 2021

So I was outside today talking with a friend of mine when I happened to look over at my bee balm and see this "thing" flying around it. I had never seen anything like this before and said so to my friend. He started looking at it and said it looked like a hummingbird. I have many hummingbirds around my home and I said it definitely wasn't a hummingbird, but then I got curious. When I came in the house I googled "moth hummingbird" and this is exactly what it was! Have you ever seen one? It was amazing to watch and I wanted to share some photos and information about them with you. This species is called a Clearwing moth. So in actuality it is a moth not a bird. If you look closely at the photos you can actually see through the wings, thus the name "clear wing". If you have tomato or tobacco hornworm caterpillars eating your tomatoes than you have some of these moths around since this is where they come from. These moths feed during the day and only on nectar which is different from many other moths. They love lilacs, bee balm and thistles. All of which I have on my property. They grow to about 2.5 inches in length, their wings beat at 70 beats a second and their life span is about 7 months. A hummingbird will beat its' wings about 90 times a second. Moth hummingbirds don't have a beak but a tongue like proboscis that can roll out and is double their body length. If you look closely in some of the photos you can see it! (I took the photos)