Virginia runs on one dependable breeder and a genuinely unusual second act: almost the moment Ruby-throated Hummingbird leaves for the season, Rufous Hummingbird picks up almost exactly where it left off. Nine more species turn up as genuine rarities, mostly a handful of individual winter birds along the coast. Here's how the year actually unfolds, region by region.

The short answer: Ruby-throated arrives statewide by mid-to-late April and is gone from most of the state by mid-October. Rufous — real, annual, but never common — starts building through October and stays present into the following spring, strongest on the coast and in the Piedmont/mountain counties. Between the two, Virginia has a hummingbird nearly year-round; it's just two different birds handing off the season.

Virginia's Hummingbird Season at a Glance

Before the region-by-region detail below, here's the whole season in one picture.

How often Ruby-throated Hummingbird — Virginia's only confirmed breeder — shows up on eBird checklists, week by week, statewide, 2016–2025. Nine more species have been documented in Virginia, but only one, Rufous Hummingbird, has a real seasonal pattern worth charting — see its own chart just below. The rest are true rarities: five (Black-chinned, Anna's, Calliope, Buff-bellied, Allen's) have real, accepted records but too few sightings to show a reliable shape, and three (Rivoli's, Violet-crowned, Mexican Violetear) have just a single accepted record each, with no real eBird trail behind it. Full details on each are in the Sources section below.

Rufous is real, but its numbers are so much smaller than Ruby-throated's that putting them on the same chart would basically erase them — not because anything's hiding them, they're just a different scale entirely. Here it is on its own, where its actual shape finally shows.

Rufous Hummingbird alone, scaled to its own real range — the only Virginia species outside Ruby-throated with a genuine, recurring multi-week pattern. Source: same eBird pull as above.

Arrival and departure windows by region, based on eBird checklist data (Cornell Lab of Ornithology), 2016–2025.

January & February: Rufous's Winter Tail End

Ruby-throated is entirely absent — this is the one stretch of the year with zero real signal from Virginia's breeding species. But the calendar isn't actually blank: Rufous Hummingbird, having built up through November and December, is still around in small numbers — mostly just a handful of birds finishing out a stay that started back in the fall. If you're seeing a hummingbird at a Virginia feeder in January, it's virtually certain to be this species, not a very-early Ruby-throated.

What to do: If you're hosting one of these birds, keep the feeder up and don't take it as a sign spring has arrived early — Ruby-throated is still roughly ten weeks out.

March: The True Quiet Month

The one genuinely empty stretch of Virginia's year. Ruby-throated hasn't arrived anywhere in the state yet, and Rufous's winter presence has thinned to its lowest point before the following fall's arrivals begin. A feeder left up through March mostly just needs a fresh, unspoiled nectar change — nothing to actively watch for yet.

April: Arrival, Coast to Mountains

Ruby-throated's real spring arrival, and it doesn't happen on the same week statewide. The coast, Piedmont, and Northern Virginia see reliable activity by mid-April; the Shenandoah Valley and Southwest Virginia — genuinely cooler, higher-elevation zones — run about a week to ten days behind.

"Arrival" here means the first week a region's Ruby-throated reports climb clearly and steadily above the winter baseline — not just a one-week blip. We checked the actual number of checklists behind each of these, not just the percentage, and made sure the pattern held for several weeks running before calling it real.

Get your feeder up before the wave reaches you, not after. Arrivals stagger in from the coast to the mountains through April, so a feeder that's out a week early costs nothing — one that's still in the box when the first bird shows up costs you a sighting. If more than one bird ends up claiming your yard once the wave is in full swing, a second feeder gives them room to spread out instead of contesting one station. Shop AspenPerch® →

May: The Wave Finishes Arriving

By early May, arrival is complete statewide and Ruby-throated numbers are building toward the summer plateau. This is also when territorial behavior around feeders starts becoming visible, as birds settle into breeding territories rather than just passing through.

June: Nesting Season Settles In

Virginia's breeding population settles in for real. Females are on nests through this stretch, and feeder activity can look quieter simply because incubating and brooding females visit less often — not a sign birds have left.

It's part of why Pop's Nectar includes calcium and electrolytes rather than sugar alone. Nesting females need a real source of calcium during egg-laying, and there isn't one in nectar alone. Shop Pop's Nectar → Read more on the research behind it.

July: Deep Summer Heat

Nesting continues into July for later broods, but the month's real signature is the heat — and with it, ants and bees competing for the same nectar hummingbirds need.

Keep pests off without pesticides — hummingbirds rely on small insects for protein, so spraying near a feeder can cost them a food source, not just protect one. AspenPerch®'s built-in ant moat blocks ants with a water barrier, and Hummguard™ Nectar Tips keep bees and wasps out without changing anything for the birds. Shop AspenPerch® → | Shop Hummguard™ →

August: Fueling Up for the Journey

Virginia's Ruby-throated population is at or near its statewide peak, and birds are entering hyperphagia — the pre-migration feeding surge that builds the fat reserves needed for the trip south. This is Virginia's real fueling window, right before the September peak and the sharp decline that follows it.

This is the month to be generous, not economical. Birds fueling for a long flight need feeders topped up more often — the large 2lb Nectarlyte® powder or the Nectarade® liquid concentrate keeps you from running out mid-surge. Shop Nectarlyte® 2lb → | Shop Nectarade® Concentrate →

September: Peak Season, Then the Turn

Virginia's single busiest week of the year for hummingbirds: the first week of September, when Ruby-throated hits its statewide peak of 32% of checklists. That peak doesn't hold — by the last week of the month, numbers are already falling fast statewide as the southbound migration gets underway in earnest.

October: Most Ruby-throateds Leave, and It's the Planting Month

Virginia's breeding population continues to leave through October, and by mid-to-late month most of the state is quiet again — Fairfax, Virginia Beach, and Albemarle are typically down to stragglers by mid-October; Augusta and Montgomery, running on the later end all season, follow by late October.

October is a departure month, but it's also a planting one — the timing works out well for both.

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What to do: Take your feeder down about two weeks after your last Ruby-throated sighting, not by a fixed date — that accounts for your own yard and this year's weather better than any calendar date can. If you're on the Eastern Shore, keep at least one feeder up regardless: Northampton is Virginia's one region that doesn't follow the rest of the state's October exit.

November: Rufous Takes Over

This is Virginia's real handoff month. Ruby-throated is gone from nearly the entire state by now — except Northampton County, where a real, recurring pattern (not stragglers) keeps birds present into early November. At the same time, Rufous Hummingbird's real fall build genuinely gets underway, climbing through the month toward its December peak.

Seeing one bird chase everyone else off? That's usually a resident claiming both the feeder and a nearby swing as its own guarded territory. A second feeder and a second swing, spaced out of sight of each other, gives another bird — the incoming migrant or a displaced resident — its own station to guard instead of fighting over one. Shop a second feeder → | Shop swings →

December: The Handoff Completes

Mid-December is Rufous's best shot all year — its numbers are never going to rival Ruby-throated's big September crowd, but this really is its busiest stretch, not a fluke or a one-off. If you spot a hummingbird at your feeder this month, it's almost certainly this one. From here, Rufous starts winding down too, easing into the same quiet stretch that opened this whole calendar.

The Year at a Glance

Frequently Asked Questions

When do hummingbirds arrive in Virginia?

Mid-April on the coast, in Hampton Roads, and around Richmond and Charlottesville; the third week of April in the Shenandoah Valley and Southwest Virginia, which run consistently a week to ten days behind the rest of the state.

When do hummingbirds leave Virginia?

Most of the state is quiet again by mid-to-late October. The one exception is the Eastern Shore, where Ruby-throated activity genuinely continues into early November before Rufous Hummingbird takes over for the winter.

Are there hummingbirds in Virginia in the winter?

Yes — Rufous Hummingbird, real and annual, though never common (Virginia's own records committee, VARCOM, classifies it as "Occasional": expected every year, but not something you can reliably count on seeing). It's present from roughly October through the following spring, most consistently in the Piedmont, the mountains, and along the coast.

Why is my Richmond feeder quiet in early April?

It isn't behind schedule — Richmond sits in the same general timing band as the rest of the Piedmont, with reliable Ruby-throated activity typically starting in the second week of April, not the first.

Should I keep a feeder up through a Virginia winter?

It's worth it almost anywhere in the state at low odds, and a genuinely good idea if you're near the coast or in the mountains, where Rufous's real pattern concentrates. Keep nectar fresh through cold snaps rather than assuming an empty feeder in January means nothing's coming.

Why We Built This Calendar

Pop's Birding has been helping hummingbird lovers for three generations. One of the questions our customers ask most often is "When do hummingbirds arrive and leave my state?" — we built this calendar to give a direct, sourced answer, not a generic one. Most timing advice online gives a single date for an entire state, which is exactly wrong for a place the size of Virginia: the coast gets its first arrivals a week to ten days before the mountains and valley do, and the standard "gone by fall" answer misses that Virginia has a real second act most timing guides don't mention at all. We wanted a calendar that tells you the truth for where you actually live, not an average that's wrong for a third of the state.

How We Built This Calendar

We pulled eBird bar chart data (Cornell Lab of Ornithology) for Virginia statewide and for six counties — Fairfax, Virginia Beach, Northampton, Augusta, Montgomery, and Albemarle — covering 2016 through 2025, chosen to represent Virginia's genuinely different climate zones rather than just its most populous places. "Arrives" is the first week a region's reports clearly and durably rise above the winter baseline; we check the raw checklist counts behind that crossing, not just the percentage, since a thinly-birded county can cross a percentage threshold on much weaker underlying signal than a heavily-birded one. Before any species went on a chart, we screened its full weekly series — not just its peak — for eBird's own 0.15% rounding-floor artifact, which can otherwise show up as a small, real-looking bump with no real signal behind it.

We cross-check every rare species against the Virginia Avian Records Committee's own accepted-record history rather than eBird frequency alone — the real distinguishing signal for Virginia's rarities isn't how often they show up on checklists, it's how many individually-accepted records exist at all, most in the single digits. The genuine finding from this build: Ruby-throated and Rufous aren't just "a common bird and a rare one" — their real seasons barely overlap. Rufous sits at effectively zero for the entire period Ruby-throated is present, then builds through exactly the weeks Ruby-throated is leaving. That's not available from a single statewide percentage; it only shows up once the two species' weekly shapes are compared directly, which is what both charts above are built to do honestly rather than misleadingly.

Sources

• eBird bar chart data, Cornell Lab of Ornithology — Virginia statewide and county-level (Fairfax, Virginia Beach, Northampton, Augusta, Montgomery, Albemarle), 2016–2025. Source for all seasonal timing and the regional arrival pattern.
• Virginia Avian Records Committee, Official State Checklist (Virginia Society of Ornithology). Source for Virginia's full 10-species list and status codes for every rare visitor.
• Virginia Avian Records Committee (VARCOM). Source for Rufous Hummingbird's "Occasional" classification and individual rare-species record histories.
• American Bird Conservancy. Source for Ruby-throated Hummingbird's status as Virginia's sole breeding species and typical winter absence.