When to Put Out Hummingbird Feeders (and Take Them Down) by Region

Hang a hummingbird feeder shortly before the first birds usually reach your area, and leave it up until well after the last one has gone. Audubon's feeding FAQ says "about a week before they normally arrive in your yard"; its hummingbird-yard guide says to check eBird for the first local sightings and hang feeders "a couple of weeks before that." Only the calendar changes by region.

Spring arrival by region

Regions follow Audubon's spring arrival guide (Geoff LeBaron, updated March 2026), with Maine Audubon and the Cornell Lab where they add detail. "Feeder out by" appears only where a source states it.

Region	Main species	First birds arrive	Feeder out by	Source
Gulf Coast and Southeast	Ruby-throated	In numbers along the Gulf Coast by early March; increasingly present year-round in the Southeast	Early March	Audubon
Coastal Texas and Louisiana	Not specified	May visit feeders in late winter and early spring	—	Audubon
Northern states (East)	Ruby-throated	Late April or early May	Late April (Northeast)	Audubon
Maine	Ruby-throated	End of April	—	Maine Audubon
Mountain West, near the Mexican border	Broad-tailed, Black-chinned, Calliope	Starting early March, "as the first flowers bloom"	—	Audubon
Northern Rockies	Broad-tailed, Black-chinned, Calliope	Early to mid-May	—	Audubon
Pacific Coast migrants	Rufous	Oregon by the end of February (Audubon); Washington and British Columbia by May (Cornell)	—	Audubon, Cornell
Southwest and West Coast to British Columbia	Anna's, Allen's	Present year-round	Year-round	Audubon

Males come first: Audubon says migrating males usually arrive "a week or so before females"; Journey North says males leave Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula about 10 days ahead of the first females. The wave moves slowly: per Journey North, Ruby-throats start north as early as January, some fly 500 miles across the Gulf of Mexico, they make landfall in late February or early March, and then average about 20 miles per day northbound. Audubon adds that Ruby-throats now leave their winter homes earlier as conditions warm.

Spring arrival window
Fall movement or departure
Season between the two (Maine)
Present year-round

Gulf Coast and Southeast: early March.
Northern states (East): late April or early May.
Maine: end of April; gone by the first week of October.
Mountain West near the Mexican border: from early March.
Northern Rockies: early to mid-May.
Oregon: Rufous by the end of February.
Southwest and West Coast to British Columbia: year-round.
Rocky Mountains: Rufous may head south from July.
East: Ruby-throated males may leave from August.

Timeline drawn for Birdaday Field Notes from the timings stated by Audubon ("When to Expect Hummingbirds", "How to Create a Hummingbird-Friendly Yard"), Maine Audubon and the Cornell Lab's All About Birds species accounts. Block widths approximate phrases such as "early March" and "late April"; they are not exact dates. Not to scale; actual dates vary by year and location.

Find your own date in four steps

Open eBird bar charts. Tap "Bar Charts" on eBird's Explore page, or on any Region or Hotspot page, and pick your county. eBird's help center says each bar shows frequency: the share of complete checklists in that area reporting the species for that week of the year. Taller bars mean more checklists report it, and a missing bar means no reports in that period.
Find the first spring week with a bar for your hummingbird species (Ruby-throated in the East, or the western species in the table above).
Count back one to two weeks. That is the window between Audubon's "about a week" (feeding FAQ) and "a couple of weeks" (yard guide). Have a clean feeder and fresh 1:4 nectar ready; the nectar calculator sizes the batch.
Watch the live wave. Journey North's maps track the spring migration north, and the project welcomes sighting reports year-round. Audubon also suggests asking a local Audubon chapter or bird club.

The fall myth: feeders don't stop migration

A common belief is that a feeder left up in fall will "trap" hummingbirds that should be heading south. All three sources reject it:

Cornell Lab of Ornithology: "Keeping your feeders up has no influence on whether a bird will start its journey south." Day length is the most significant cue, and hummingbirds "will migrate regardless of whether feeders are kept up."
National Audubon Society: hummingbirds are "genetically programmed to head south in the fall." They respond to changes in day length and the sun's angle; "It's not a lack of nectar source or colder weather that makes them leave."
Maine Audubon: asked whether leaving feeders up prevents migration, its staff naturalist answers "No. If anything, it probably helps."

A fall feeder simply fuels the trip: Journey North notes that hummingbirds "feed intensely" before migrating.

When fall migration happens

Ruby-throated: males may start migrating as early as August, and by early fall the species is bound for Central America (Cornell). Journey North estimates southbound travel at fewer than 25 miles per day and says most Ruby-throats winter between southern Mexico and northern Panama.
Maine: Ruby-throats have "pretty much completely migrated south by the first week in October." Maine Audubon asks people to report any hummingbird seen in the state after October 15.
Rufous: may start south as early as July, traveling down the Rocky Mountains. On their migration route, visiting Rufous "are likely to move on after just a week or two" (Cornell).

When to take feeders down

The sources agree on direction and differ on length. Treat the shortest as the minimum:

Source	Advice
Audubon, hummingbird-yard guide	Keep feeders up for two weeks after you see the last bird using it
Cornell Lab, All About Birds	Keep feeders up for several weeks after the last hummingbird leaves, in case a straggler needs energy
Audubon, feeding FAQ	Leave feeders out as long as you have hummingbirds around; late migrants and out-of-range species can turn up into early winter
Maine Audubon	Keep them "up and filled for as long as you can, up until just before they freeze"

Late-season feeder checklist

Keep cleaning on schedule, even if nobody is drinking (Audubon FAQ). Audubon's yard guide says to clean feeders every 2–3 days, or daily in particularly hot weather. Our hummingbird feeder guide has a full schedule by temperature.
Throw out unused nectar whenever you take the feeder down for cleaning (Audubon FAQ).
Watch the overnight low. Sugar water freezes at a lower temperature than plain water, so a slight dip below freezing may leave it liquid. If nights regularly drop below freezing, keep the nectar from freezing (Audubon FAQ). Maine Audubon suggests bringing feeders inside on near-freezing nights and re-hanging them early in the morning.
Don't worry about cold nectar. Audubon says drinking it does not appear to "cold stun" the birds.
Feed a late bird. A hummingbird past migration time can be fed for as long as it stays, following the steps above (Audubon FAQ).
Plant for the shoulder seasons. Audubon says native plants such as trumpet honeysuckle, bee balm and hummingbird sage "provide much more nectar than hybrids and exotics."

Year-round hummingbird areas

Where hummingbirds stay all year, Audubon's answer to year-round feeding is "Absolutely!", with clean feeders. Regular overwintering species include Anna's (Pacific coast, northwestern Baja California to British Columbia), Allen's (coastal Southern California) and Costa's (Baja California, southeastern California, western Arizona); several species also winter along the Gulf Coast, in southern Arizona and in south Florida. For the eastern species, see the Ruby-throated profile in common backyard birds. A first spring hummingbird is also a good new species for a Bird-a-Day streak.

When to put out hummingbird feeders, and when to take them down