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Available for over a year

In this series for ���˿��� Sounds and ���˿��� Radio 4, best-selling author and scholar Katherine Rundell celebrates the lives of twenty astonishing but endangered animals. Each short essay includes fascinating stories that connect natural history with cultural insight, myth and science - revealing how animals have shaped human imagination, and how our choices now shape their survival. In this episode, Katherine introduces the hummingbird - the smallest living bird, hatched from eggs typically no bigger than a chickpea, and explains how these birds, named for the sound of their wings, see a world far more vivid than ours, thanks to ultraviolet-sensitive cones in their eyes. We also hear how Queen Victoria’s fascination with hummingbirds helped spark a craze that led to their use in jewellery - and eventually to the founding of the RSPB. Today, more than 10% of hummingbird species are endangered. Katherine explores why we need them - not only for pollination, but as dazzling proof of nature’s ability to evolve in colours beyond our imagination. Written and Presented by Katherine Rundell Produced by Natalie Donovan for ���˿��� Audio in Bristol