Diet and Foraging

Little Hermit is primarily nectarivorous. Flowering plants most oftene visited by Little Hermit include Heliconia (Muscaceae), Cephaelis mucosa (Rubiaceae), Pachystachys coccinea (Acanthaceae), Justica species (Acanthaceae), and Costus spiralis (Zingiberacea) (Snow and Snow 1972). These selections of plants all have red, orange, or pink blossoms, and a tubular corolla (Snow and Snow 1972). Most flowers visited by Little Hermit are herbaceous, although it frequently forages at the shrub Palicourea crocea (Rubiacae), and occasionally visits flowering bromeliads (Snow and Snow 1972).

Little Hermit also consumes small arthropods, including spiders (Haverschmidt 1968, Snow and Snow 1972), as do most if not all species of hummingbirds (Remsen et al. 1986).