How to choose a hummingbird feeder

1. Saucer or bottle

This one decision predicts whether your feeder drips, whether bees move in, and how long the wash takes — because all three follow from where the nectar sits relative to the ports. Saucer, for almost everyone. The full argument is on saucer vs bottle.

2. How does it come apart?

The question nobody asks in the store and everybody asks in July. Nectar has to be changed every three to five days in moderate weather and daily when it is hot, and the feeder needs washing at the same time. Over a six-month season that is somewhere between forty and a hundred washes.

Before buying, find out:

• Does the lid lift or twist off in one motion, or is it a long thread?
• Does the base separate from the reservoir, exposing the underside of the ports?
• Do the ports themselves come out?
• Will a standard bottle brush fit through the opening?

If the listing does not answer these, that is itself informative. We score cleaning access on every product on this site for exactly this reason — how we do it.

3. Insect defense, built in rather than bought later

Two separate problems with two unrelated solutions, and a feeder that ships with both saves you money and a trip.

Ants are stopped by a moat — a small cup of water between the hook and the feeder, which they will not cross. The HummZinger line, both Kingsyard models, the More Birds Ruby and the First Nature bases all include one. More on ants.

Bees and wasps are stopped by geometry — either a saucer design that puts nectar below their reach, or fitted guards like Nectar-Guard tips. More on bees.

A moat does nothing for bees, and a bee guard does nothing for ants. Get both.

4. Capacity — smaller than you think

Eight to sixteen ounces. The instinct is to buy big so you refill less, and it is backwards: nectar spoils on a schedule set by temperature rather than volume, so a large feeder in an average yard produces sugar water you pour away, not fewer trips. Buy the size your birds finish in two or three days. The arithmetic.

If you want more birds, the upgrade is a second small feeder somewhere the first one cannot be seen from — not a bigger single feeder.

5. Glass or plastic

Glass stays optically clear for years; plastic hazes under UV and then hides the state of the nectar. Against that, glass breaks and is heavy. Plastic anywhere windy, high, or over a hard surface; glass otherwise. Note that design outranks material — a plastic saucer beats a glass bottle. The comparison.

6. Mounting

Hanging is the default and works with an ant moat. Post-mounting is more stable in wind but gives ants a direct route up the pole, so it needs a different answer. Window mounting gets you the closest view available and depends on suction cups that need re-checking after the first hot week. Wherever it goes, it needs to be at a height you can service without a ladder. Where to hang it.

What to buy on day one

Three things, and the total is under forty dollars in most seasons:

1. A saucer feeder that comes apart in two pieces, with a moat built in.
2. A three-piece brush kit — specifically for the port brush, which is the only tool that reaches inside a feeding port.
3. A bag of plain white sugar. Not honey, not brown sugar, not anything labeled raw or organic. The recipe is four parts water to one part sugar and nothing else.

Then hang it somewhere shaded, and check when to put it out if it is early in the season.