How to Get a Hummingbird Out of a Garage
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A simple trick on how to get a hummingbird out of a garage. It really works! (See the comments for proof!)
Guest post and photography by Curt Casteel (Rachel’s Dad)
Every summer a strange phenomenon takes place in many American garages: Hummingbirds fly in, but they don’t fly out. They will stay in there, with the door wide open, until they keel over dead. Weird, right?
Here’s why it happens, and how to get a hummingbird out of a garage. Time to convince your family you are a “hummingbird whisperer.”
Why Hummingbirds Fly Into Garages
A hummingbird has the metabolism of, well, a hummingbird. Since their next meal is usually found inside something colored bright red, yellow, orange, or purple, their tiny brains are programmed to seek these hues.
Enter the Law of Unintended Consequences. The government requires every electric garage door opener to have a release handle so if it becomes stuck, you can pull this handle to manually raise and lower the door.
If you step out into your garage and look up, you’ll see that this dangling little handle is, that’s right, RED, and shaped roughly like a trumpet vine flower. You’re already ahead of me, aren’t you?
The unintended consequence of that red handle is that a hummingbird flies by an open garage, sees a little red “flower” inside, and zips in to investigate. Upon finding they can’t stick their tongues inside that plastic handle for some nectar, most turn around and leave. But a surprising number make a fatal error—they fly up.
Regardless of the reason, once they get it in their heads that “up” is the only way out, they refuse to fly through the open door.
This ends badly. The confused hummingbird will hover near the ceiling, searching every high corner of the room, until it has to rest, usually on the garage door track or a light fixture. It will repeat this cycle until it is completely exhausted and dies, which can take only a few of hours.
How to Get a Hummingbird Out of a Garage
Some of you this summer will head out into the garage with the kids to go somewhere and find one of our little feathered buddies in exactly the situation I’ve described.
Stay cool.
Load the family up in the minivan, back out into the driveway, and tell them, “Watch this.” Trot back into the garage and grab your leaf rake. Slowly, slowly move the business end of the rake up to within just a few of inches of the hovering or resting hummingbird.
Be patient. It will, depending on its level of exhaustion, land on the tines of the rake within just a few seconds.
Then very slowly lower the rake a couple of feet and move toward the open door. Once it sees more blue sky than garage ceiling the hummingbird will probably take off, but it might be so tired it needs to rest a minute even when you are all the way outside.
All the more time for you to look awesome for little onlookers.
Congratulations! You just saved a hummingbird’s life!
My husband can’t believe this worked. We are so glad it did! Thank you for posting and helping save so many hummingbirds!
Thank you so much for the tip! It worked and we are so happy to see the little bird fly in the sky.
That’s great to hear it worked again. 🙂
This worked for us too! Thank you
Definitely worked!! Thanks for such a great tip:-)
Thanks so much for this awesome tip! It worked like a charm. We were so worried about the little guy who flew into our garage on a really hot evening. So glad we were able to get him back outdoors.
Great to hear!
Thank you for the tip, it worked great
Glad to hear it worked!
Thank you for the tip. It me took a few tries – it would not sit on the rake.
Finally I inverted it, tine side up and pushed it almost parallel to ceiling. Nowhere to go it settled on the rake.
Thank you!
Thank you so much!! Hubby grabbed a red brushed push broom and was able to rescue not one but two of our sweet little hummingbirds!! Fly! Be free!!
Alright! Another life saved. 🙂
It works. But I actually did it before I read this post. Thanks for posting. Love those hummingbirds and was so worried he/she was going to die in there.
THANK YOU! Late this evening it worked exactly as you said it would!
Wonderful, glad to hear that!
Thank you so much for this. A freshly arrived baby hummingbird got into the garage yesterday when I was unloading groceries and I was nearly as panicked as she was. Ceiling was too high for a rake, but an extending lightbulb changing pole thingy did the the trick after just three or four tries. What a relief! It’s been a joy all day to see her relaxed at the feeder —outside. (And I’ve covered that red temptress with blue duct tape already, don’t you know.) Your advice saved another life!
Took a few tries but it worked. Thanks!
Yep… Worked great for us! Thanks!
Oh… And I dipped the rake tines in sugar water and he landed and stayed on long enough to walk him out!
Woke to the hummingbird in garage. I followed the approach using a red tinted small landscaping rake. Took more than 5 minutes, but less than an hour. My success came after closing the big door, and turning off all lights except from the open side garage entry to yard. After about 15 minutes, he was exhausted and did land on the times. Very slow movement was key, as it took 3 times landing on my rake to get him outside. But another success story.
Unfortunately, the little hummingbird didn’t like the metal rake method. 🙁 So we tried a long thin blank fishing pole for it to land on for its small feet to perch on. He landed a few times and after the 5th try we were able to lower the rod slowly then directly out of garage.
Good problem solving. Glad it worked!
They don’t always come to the object you’re holding near them (rake for example) don’t let that discourage you, they are panicked usually. I’ve had hummingbirds rest on the rake multiple times and when i start slowly lowering it they fly back up. there is an uncovered sun window on the outside portion of the roof and the hummingbirds go up it and dont know how to come down, it’s sad because i often hear them first and then see them fluttering around so much that they hit their heads against the plastic “window” at the top. a tip: since they seem to land often enough i learned to start using something to cover/encase them so they dont fly up when i start lowering them. in my case i used one of those deep net poles that you use to clean debris out of pools. i put some sticks in it to keep it propped open and then i used the rake in one hand, and when it landed i slowly enclose it with the propped open pool net stick. and then i release it out in the open. personally im so use to the routine that a pair of goggles comes in handy because youre looking up and sometimes the hummingbird is kicking up dust/debris from the areas its landing on or flapping around.
Thank you for posting a way to save a hummingbird from the garage. It is frightful to think the little creature couldn’t get out by itself. I am so grateful for this post. I immediately got out a rake and after about the 5th time successfully got the bird out.
Glad it was helpful!