Editing Ruby-throated hummingbird (section)

=== Food and feeding ===
[[File:RubyThroatedHummingbird(Crop).jpg|thumb|left|Female feeding on nectar from scarlet beebalm (''[[Monarda didyma]]'')]]

Nectar from [[flower]]s and flowering trees, as well as small insects and spiders, are its main food.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Ruby-throated Hummingbird {{!}} Audubon Field Guide |url=https://www.audubon.org/field-guide/bird/ruby-throated-hummingbird |access-date=2024-04-25 |website=Audubon |language=en}}</ref> Although hummingbirds are well known to feed on nectar, small [[arthropod]]s are an important source part of protein, minerals, and vitamins in the diet of adult hummingbirds. Hummingbirds show a slight preference for red, orange, and bright pink [[Cylinder (geometry)|tubular]] flowers as [[nectar]] sources, though flowers not [[Ornithophilous|adapted to hummingbird pollination]] (e.g., [[willow]] catkins) are also visited.<ref name="robinsonetal1996"/> Their diet may also occasionally include sugar-rich tree [[sap]] taken from [[sapsucker]] wells. The birds feed from flowers using a long, extendable tongue and catch insects on the wing or glean them from flowers, leaves, bark, and spiders' webs.

Young birds are fed insects for [[protein]] since nectar is an insufficient source of protein for the growing birds.<ref name="robinsonetal1996"/>