{"id":53217,"date":"2018-07-25T05:27:34","date_gmt":"2018-07-25T11:27:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/?p=53217"},"modified":"2025-11-08T13:15:24","modified_gmt":"2025-11-08T19:15:24","slug":"juvenile-western-kingbirds-in-box-elder-county-utah","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2018\/07\/25\/juvenile-western-kingbirds-in-box-elder-county-utah\/","title":{"rendered":"Juvenile Western Kingbirds in Box Elder County, Utah"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last week while I was up in Box Elder County<\/span><\/a> looking for birds I found several juvenile Western Kingbirds begging to be fed by the adults that were nearby.<\/p>\n

I couldn’t get any decent images of the kingbird juveniles because of my distance from them and the fact that they were partially hidden by railings from a corral that was painted green.<\/p>\n

Those juveniles did remind me of photos I had taken last year of some juvenile kingbirds next to a different country road in Box Elder County that I had never processed.<\/p>\n

\"JuvenileJuvenile Western Kingbird next to a country road – Nikon D500, f8, 1\/1250, ISO 400, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

Juvenile Western Kingbirds may look sweet like this one does perched on a fence. But they can be rather pushy when it comes to demanding food from their parents and they are also quite noisy too while they are begging.<\/p>\n

\"CuriousCurious Western Kingbird juvenile – Nikon D500, f8, 1\/1600, ISO 400, -0.3 EV, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light<\/span><\/p>\n

At this age the juvenile Western Kingbirds are beginning to learn to hunt on their own but the adult kingbirds still feed them because they miss more prey when they hunt than they catch.<\/p>\n

It is fun to watch them try though and I feel myself cheering them on when they dive towards the ground after prey.<\/p>\n

\"JuvenileJuvenile Western Kingbird perched on a fence in Box Elder County – Nikon D500, f8, 1\/1600, ISO 400, Nikkor 500mm VR with 1.4x TC, natural light<\/span><\/p>\n

The Western Kingbird juveniles in these photos are just a little bit older than the ones I saw last week.<\/p>\n

I hope I will see more juveniles this summer that I can photograph while they beg and learn to hunt on their own where I don’t have to deal with the rails of a corral being in the way.<\/p>\n

Life is<\/em> good.<\/p>\n

Mia<\/p>\n

Click here<\/span><\/a> to see more of my Western Kingbird photos plus facts and information about this species.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Juvenile Western Kingbirds may look sweet like this one does perched on a fence but they can be rather pushy when it comes to demanding food from their parents and they are also quite noisy too while they are begging.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":163194,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,1148,26,534],"tags":[4430,11563,3830,3808,4884,4067,4071,3791,3772,4104,4183,4411,4193],"class_list":["post-53217","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-avian","category-box-elder-county-utah","category-utah","category-western-kingbirds","tag-barbed-wire","tag-farmlands","tag-fence","tag-flycatcher","tag-flycatchers","tag-immature","tag-juvenile","tag-kingbird","tag-kingbirds","tag-perched","tag-tyrannus-verticalis","tag-western-kingbird","tag-young"],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-juvenile-mia-mcpherson-1123.jpg","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p11Mom-dQl","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":47498,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2017\/06\/30\/juvenile-eastern-and-western-kingbirds\/","url_meta":{"origin":53217,"position":0},"title":"Juvenile Eastern and Western Kingbirds – Their Ranges Overlap Here in Utah","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"June 30, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"The ranges for these two species of kingbirds overlap here in northern Utah but I see more of the Western Kingbirds than I do the Eastern Kingbirds.","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Juvenile Western Kingbird perched on an old fence post, Box Elder County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/western-kingbird-juvenile-fence-post-mia-mcpherson-0593.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/western-kingbird-juvenile-fence-post-mia-mcpherson-0593.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, 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Refuge","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/locations\/utah\/bear-river-migratory-bird-refuge\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Juvenile Eastern Kingbird perched on a fence post at Farmington Bay WMA, Davis County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/eastern-kingbird-juvenile-mia-mcpherson-2786.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/eastern-kingbird-juvenile-mia-mcpherson-2786.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/eastern-kingbird-juvenile-mia-mcpherson-2786.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/09\/eastern-kingbird-juvenile-mia-mcpherson-2786.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 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Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-young-mia-mcpherson-0064.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-young-mia-mcpherson-0064.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-young-mia-mcpherson-0064.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-young-mia-mcpherson-0064.jpg?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":26986,"url":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/2015\/07\/30\/western-kingbirds-juveniles-begging-to-be-fed\/","url_meta":{"origin":53217,"position":3},"title":"Western Kingbirds – Juveniles Begging To Be Fed","author":"Mia McPherson","date":"July 30, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"So even though I didn't come home with many Burrowing Owls images yesterday these Western Kingbird images more than made up for it!","rel":"","context":"In "Birds"","block_context":{"text":"Birds","link":"https:\/\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/category\/avian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Juvenile Western Kingbird hovering in flight, Box Elder County, Utah","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-juvenile-flight-mia-mcpherson-0368.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-juvenile-flight-mia-mcpherson-0368.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.onthewingphotography.com\/wings\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/western-kingbird-juvenile-flight-mia-mcpherson-0368.jpg?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, 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