This little beast
Sword-billed Hummingbird Ensifera ensifera
Can it also use that unwieldly bill to catch insects?
Since flower nectars contain very little in the way of proteins or vitamins, all hummingbirds have to eat insects in order to obtain adequate nutrition. This said, I have no idea how the Sword-bill manages to catch bugs with that honker. There have been few if any studies of its ecology.
I’ve only seen the species twice, once in Ecuador and once above Macchu Pichu in Peru. They fly with the bill pointing up at an angle (even moreso than in the photo), almost like a man trying to balance a pool cue on his nose. It’s quite comical to see.
I know very little about hummingbirds, however I do know that it is often the case that deep-throated flowers often contain small invertebrates; it may be that these and some other hummingbirds are ingesting their RDA of protein incidentally.
I’ll confess to profound ignorance here, and I’d be most interested to hear more. Is it really the case that all animals must ingest protein? How much protein is in the diet of a herbivore such as a cow? Can’t such animals do rather well on grass alone?
I’ve seen pictures of a hummingbird eating an insect (the pics were to show how bendy the beak is), so some hummingbirds obviously can (you may have known this already.) I have no idea about that particular species.
If they want to synthesize protein of their own (and they must, in order to maintain body structures) they need to ingest any amino acids they can’t synthesize, and the readiest source of these is proteins. Grass, of course, like most living matter, contains proteins, though at much lower concentrations than in meat, which is mostly protein.