QUESTION
I noticed an odd critter at our Haliburton cottage. At first I thought the little creature was a hummingbird, but on closer inspection I realized it didn't have feet and is, in fact, an insect. Can anyone tell me what it is?

ANSWER

It's a hummingbird moth, hovering above your flowers for the same reason a real hummer would: to feed on the nectar. As you discovered, this species is active by day, as are some other members of its family, the Sphingidae (also known as sphinx or hawk moths).

The name "hummingbird moth" has been applied to a number of sphingid species. Doug Currie, curator of entomology at the Royal Ontario Museum, says that though he can't be certain from your picture which one this is, he'd guess it's Hemaris thysbe, often called the hummingbird clearwing. There are four North American species of Hemaris, of which three occur in Ontario: H. thysbe, H. diffinis (snowberry clearwing), and H. gracilis (slender clearwing).

Though it's tempting to assume that this three-centimetre-long critter's resemblance to the much larger hummingbird is a defence against predators, Currie says it's more likely to be a "convergence of evolution," meaning that the two separate species have developed similar physical configurations - in this case the mechanics that enable them to hover - in order to exploit a similar food source. (The moth sucks up its nectar using an insect's proboscis rather than a needle-sharp bird's beak, however.) In terms of evolutionary time, adds Currie, the moths have probably been around longer than the hummers have.

* Published in the April/May 2002 issue of Cottage Life