Starting in the end of February, I have been seeing a male and female ruby-throated hummingbird commonly visit the feeder.
It seems my hummingbirds have abruptly stopped drinking from the feeder. Both the male and female visit the abundance of flowers surrounding the feeder, but only a few times now do they sit and drink. I’m pretty confused because the male especially would visit very frequently.
I have a few thoughts why they may have stopped:
The trumpet vine/natural feed in the woods has bloomed and they prefer that.
It has gotten very hot around here in central Florida and I am not changing the sugar water enough (I change it every other night, but nowadays the temperature reaches mid 90s)
The other birds have increased in activity at the seed feeders and spook them away (I have all bird feeders a short distance from each other)
Those are all reasonable ideas. My yard is heavily planted with flowers for the hummers (Blue Salvia, Ipomoea quamoclit), and I do find that they visit the feeders less when there are more flowers available, though they still visit some.
Based on my observations around here (NC), the hummingbirds show up at the feeders primarily during migration in spring and fall, when there is not much in bloom for them, or when the weather has been hot and dry and plants are presumably making less nectar in response to conserve water. When certain plants are in bloom (e.g. wild columbine, firepink, cardinal flower), the birds prefer to feed on those and are less frequent at the feeder.
I live in South Florida. Here I see hummingbirds December(ish) though March(ish). During summer months they’re non-existent, as they migrate north. In most states, I tend to see them year-round, sometimes including Central Florida. So my guess is that your hummingbirds were part of a few that migrated north from Central FL. I would love to see them year-round down here :/