General

Couch's Kingbird: Large flycatcher with olive-green upperparts, gray head, dark eye patch, white throat, and bright yellow underparts. Wings and slightly forked tail are dark. Sexes are similar. Difficult to distinguish from Tropical Kingbird.

Range and Habitat

Couch's Kingbird: Resident from southern Texas south to Central America; prefers woodland borders and brushy streamside thickets.

Breeding and Nesting

Couch's Kingbird: Three to five pink to buff eggs with brown and lavender blotches are laid in a nest made of leaves, twigs, moss, weeds, and bark strips, lined with finer materials, and built 8 to 25 feet above the ground on a tree limb. Incubation ranges from 14 to 16 days and is carried out by the female.

Foraging and Feeding

Couch's Kingbird: Eats flying and crawling insects, berries, and fruits; perches on tall trees to hawk insects.

Readily Eats

Meal Worms

Vocalization

Couch's Kingbird: Song is a series of rich whistles with abrupt inflections "s'wee-s'wee-s'wee-s'wee-I-chu." Call is a high, trilled, nasal "breeeear" or a single-note or repeated "kip."

Similar Species

Couch's Kingbird: Tropical Kingbird is identical in appearance but has distinctive twittering call. Western and Cassin's kingbirds have smaller, thinner bills, paler gray ear patches, and different voices.