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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Tz'unun" data-source="post: 1550180" data-attributes="member: 14142">Hi, Jenwin,Even in a location where hummingbirds normally occur, your description would be more consistent with a moth of the family Sphingidae, also known as sphinx, hawk, or hummingbird moths. Brown is a very common color for sphinx moths but rare in hummingbirds (whose "default" color is iridescent green). Sphinxes are also relatively oblivious to human presence and easy to observe at close range, while hummingbirds are wary and seldom allow such close approach as you describe except around feeders (if then). Note that <a href="http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=27030" target="_blank">the second post PumaMan shared</a> also describes brown coloration and extremely close observation. Here's another relevant thread with photos showing a creature similar to your description:<a href="http://www.birdforum.net/showthread.php?t=137863" target="_blank">BirdForum: Hummingbird, Innisfail, North Queensland, Australia</a>Sphinx moths are found worldwide, <a href="http://linus.socs.uts.edu.au/~don/larvae/sphi/sphi-moths.html" target="_blank">including Australia</a>. The convergence in shape and behavior between these insects and hummingbirds is quite uncanny and has inspired many reports of hummingbirds from the eastern hemisphere, the most famous of which is a passage in the bestseller Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayes. They have large, dark eyes, the long proboscis looks like a thinner version of a hummingbird's bill, and some species even have a tail-like tuft of elongate scales at the tip of the abdomen. My husband jokes that the first step in identifying hummingbirds is to count the legs, but both the legs and the antennae are whisker thin and easy to overlook.</blockquote>

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