Last updated: August 21, 2026
Every spring the same question goes round the neighborhood: is it too early to hang the feeder? Somebody put theirs out three weeks ago and has seen nothing. Somebody else waited and missed the first birds entirely. And the calendar advice that circulates online is almost always written for a state that is not yours.
There is a clean answer from Audubon that works everywhere, and the only local thing you need is one date. This article covers the rule, how to find your own arrival date from a source rather than a guess, what to hang up first, and why the west coast question is a different question altogether.
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Quick Answer
When should you put out hummingbird feeders where you live?
- Audubon’s rule: hang the feeder about a week before they normally arrive in your yard.
- That arrival date varies regionally, so the only work is finding yours.
- Use Cornell Lab’s eBird bar charts for your county, or ask a local Audubon chapter.
- Parts of the Pacific Coast have hummingbirds year round, so there is no start date at all.
Bottom line: one week before your local first arrivals, whatever month that falls in.
The Rule Audubon Publishes
Put the feeder out about a week before they normally arrive in your yard, and expect that date to vary regionally. That is the whole instruction from Audubon’s hummingbird feeding guidance, and it is deliberately relative rather than a fixed calendar date, because a national date would be wrong nearly everywhere.
A week is enough of a cushion that an early bird finds food waiting, and short enough that you are not changing nectar for a month for nobody. It also means the answer changes with your latitude and elevation rather than with what a blog written in Georgia says.
Finding Your Own Arrival Date
The most reliable local source is data from your own county. Cornell Lab of Ornithology’s eBird publishes bar charts of when each species is reported through the year by region, and the point where hummingbird reports climb off the floor in spring is your arrival window.
The Human Sources
A local Audubon chapter will usually tell you the week without being asked, because it is the question they field every March. Neighbors who feed are the other shortcut: if the person two streets over hangs theirs the first weekend of a certain month every year, they have already done this research.
Why the Date Moves So Much
Because the continent is large and hummingbirds work their way north as the season opens. Cornell Lab’s species accounts place the ruby-throated hummingbird as the hummingbird of eastern North America, while the west has several species with quite different patterns, including the rufous hummingbird breeding far to the north.
Elevation matters as much as latitude in the mountain west, so a town an hour up the valley can be weeks behind the one below it. This is exactly why the rule is relative and why local data beats a national map.
The Pacific Coast Exception
In a good part of the Pacific Coast there is no season to wait for. Cornell Lab’s All About Birds describes Anna’s Hummingbird as a year round resident along the Pacific Coast, which means the feeder question there is about continuity rather than a start date.
If that is your situation, the practical planning is the reverse of everyone else’s: keeping nectar available and unfrozen through cold snaps, and keeping the cleaning schedule going in months when the rest of the country has the feeder in the garage. Our hummingbird feeder guide covers which designs handle year round service.
What to Hang Up First
One feeder, in a spot you can see and reach, with a small batch of nectar in it. Filling a large feeder to the top in the first week is how people end up dumping most of it, since there are no birds yet to drink it and the schedule still applies.
Put it where there is cover within a short flight and some shade over the reservoir if you have the choice. Placement in a small yard is its own subject, and we cover it in where to hang a hummingbird feeder.
Finding Your Date at a Glance
Species by region below comes from Cornell Lab’s All About Birds accounts. No dates, because your date is local and the sources for it are in the third column.
| Where you are | Most likely species | Where to get your date | What it means for the feeder |
|---|---|---|---|
| East of the Great Plains | Ruby-throated Hummingbird | eBird county bar chart, local Audubon chapter | Hang one feeder a week before arrivals |
| Southwest and Texas | Black-chinned and others | eBird county bar chart, local Audubon chapter | Longer season, plan for heat and shade |
| Interior west and mountains | Rufous, broad-tailed and others | eBird bar chart for your elevation | Elevation shifts the date locally |
| Pacific Coast | Anna’s Hummingbird year round | eBird, plus a local chapter for cold snaps | No start date, keep it running |
eBird is run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, so a county bar chart is source data rather than folklore. Where the table names species, that follows Cornell Lab’s range descriptions and not a guess about your yard.
What Early Feeding Does and Does Not Do
Hanging a feeder early does not summon birds that are not there yet, and it does not hold back birds that are moving. Audubon is clear that hummingbird migration is driven by changes in day length and the angle of the sun rather than by nectar availability, which is the same reasoning that answers the autumn version of this question.
What early feeding does do is catch the front of the wave, which in a cold spring can matter to a bird arriving ahead of the flowers. We take the fall side of the same question in do feeders keep hummingbirds from migrating.
Frequently Asked Questions
When should I put my hummingbird feeder out? About a week before hummingbirds normally arrive in your yard, which is Audubon’s published guidance. That date varies regionally, so look up when reports climb in your county on Cornell Lab’s eBird or ask a local Audubon chapter.
Is it bad to put the feeder out too early? Not for the birds. The cost is yours: you are changing nectar on schedule for weeks with nothing drinking it. Mix small batches if you like hanging it early.
Will hanging a feeder early make hummingbirds arrive sooner? No. Arrival is a migration timing question, and Audubon attributes hummingbird migration timing to day length and the angle of the sun rather than to food supply.
How do I find my local arrival date? Cornell Lab’s eBird publishes bar charts of species reports by region, so the spring climb in hummingbird reports for your county is your window. A local Audubon chapter is the fastest human version of the same answer.
Do I need to take the feeder in on a late frost? Nectar can freeze in a hard cold snap, which is a practical problem rather than a rule. Bringing it in overnight and rehanging it at first light is the usual workaround where hummingbirds are present in cold weather.
Should I put out more than one feeder in spring? Start with one and add a second if a single bird starts chasing others off. Hummingbirds defend feeding spots, and spacing feeders out of sight of each other is the standard answer, covered in our piece on how many feeders to run.
The Bottom Line
Audubon’s rule is a week before your local arrivals, so the only research you need is one date. Get it from a Cornell Lab eBird bar chart for your county or from a local Audubon chapter, hang a single feeder with a small batch in it, and let the rest follow. On the Pacific Coast, where Anna’s is resident year round, there is no start date to find. Read next: our hummingbird feeder guide for the first feeder to buy, and where to hang it in a small yard.