Because of work, my only birding lately has been a few minutes grabbed here and there at CyFair to see how our Western Kingbirds are getting along. (To be honest, even if my workload were lighter, I probably wouldn't be doing a lot of birding anyway since it's been 98F/36C on 8 of the last 10 days.)
The parents have moved the four young birds to some small trees behind the classroom where I teach and the family seems to be coping fine there. They should be doing well with food anyway, since the campus is very busy with dragonflies and other flying bugs.
I see the parents every day and the young when they forget to hide: Yesterday morning three of the young were too busy asking for food to notice me until I was only a few yards away. Later in the day a Loggerhead Shrike moved into their area and the parent Kingbirds lost no time swooping on it and driving it away. Interestingly, they seem to be not at all concerned about the many Northern Mockingbirds in the same area. So presumably they see Shrikes as being dangerous but Mockingbirds as not being a threat.
Weather Note:
We're having a real heatwave at present and it looks like it's going to get even worse. The forecast is 100F or higher for at least a week starting Tuesday. I hope all birdlovers in our area are keeping their birdbaths full of water!
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