Mom and Dad were met with quite a cacophony when they entered the barn on Monday morning. It seems the time has come for the baby kingbirds to learn to fly. We knew it was coming, their nest was starting to look a little like the bird version of a clown car.

Taken in Kansas by Wikimedia user "Mdf", this is a great shot.

Norma and Norman escorted the nestlings around the property, showing them the best fence posts for perching on, and encouraging them when they got stuck in awkward places (on top of the hay bales, on top of the lower barn, etc.), all while carrying on loudly at the top of their lungs.

The Cornell Lab of Ornithology describes their song as “…a series of “kip” notes followed by series of high-pitched fussy chittering notes…”, which pretty well captures what’s been going on. Especialy the “fussing”. We’re pretty sure our breeding pair has been with us before. They either laid their eggs in the barn siding last year, or they were some of those eggs.