The very smallest bird on Earth is the Bee Hummingbird, which can be found in the Zapata in Cuba. The remarkable hummingbird is barely larger than the bee it is named after and beats its tiny wings an incredible 80 times a second.
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TRANSCRIPT
- [Narrator] The very smallest bird on Earth, the Bee Hummingbird.
Barely larger than the bee it's named after, almost everything about this hummingbird is special.
They can beat their tiny wings an incredible 80 times a second.
Their tiny size makes them tasty prey for snakes, birds, even spiders.
Nothing about the Bee Hummingbird's life is easy.
They may visit over a thousand flowers a day on their eternal quest for nectar.
The males are the showoffs of the family.
Their dazzling head feathers usually irresistible to the less colorful females.
But this lady's showing no interest.
She has already mated.
For her, it's nesting time.
The whole nest is smaller than a golf ball.
The mother will lay one or two eggs the size of coffee beans and then all she can do is wait.
Three weeks must pass before she'll know if all is going to plan.
Three weeks have passed since the mother hummingbird laid her tiny eggs.
(gentle Latin guitar music) It's a good year and two healthy chicks have hatched.
Blind and helpless at birth the chicks grow explosively, doubling their weight in just four days.
Bee Hummingbirds are so scarce and their tiny nests so hard to find that this is a scene rarely, if ever, filmed before.
18 days after hatching the chicks have already grown their flight feathers.
In just a couple of days, they will leave the nest for good and, with luck, live up to seven years.
A whole new chapter in the story of the world's smallest bird.