GREATER ROADRUNNER
(Geococcyx californianus)
eBird provides this description of the Greater Roadrunner: Streaky brown overall with very long tail and slight crest. Distinctive long shape and terrestrial behavior. Usually seen on the ground, where it runs swiftly after large insects, lizards, and other prey. Also found in thick vegetation of arid habitats, and on elevated perches such as fence posts. All About Birds gives this additional descriptive information: A bird born to run, the Greater Roadrunner can outrace a human, kill a rattlesnake, and thrive in the harsh landscapes of the Desert Southwest. Roadrunners reach two feet from sturdy bill to white tail tip, with a bushy blue-black crest and mottled plumage that blends well with dusty shrubs. As they run, they hold their lean frames nearly parallel to the ground and rudder with their long tails. They have recently extended their range eastward into Missouri and Louisiana.
Since my first sighting of this bird was in a nest, here is what All About Birds says about the Greater Roadrunner nest: Male Greater Roadrunners bring twigs to the female, which she fashions into a compact platform with a nest cup about 4 inches deep. A male that pauses for too long in his stick-gathering may get reminded with a whining call from his partner, prompting him to get back to work. The finished nest can reach over 17 inches in diameter and 8 inches high, lined with leaves, grasses, feathers, smaller sticks, snakeskin, and flakes of cattle and horse manure. The parents may continue to work on the nest during incubation and build up the sides of the nest as the chicks grow. Pairs sometimes reuse a nest from a previous year.
I first saw a Greater Roadrunner sitting on a nest in a tree at the Three Rivers Petroglyph Site campground on August 8, 2015. Since that sighting, I have seen others, but was unable to get a picture. The most recent one I saw was on the Bird Trail at the South Shore Unit of Choke Canyon State Park on June 21, 2020. The birds are fast on the ground!
“Cool Facts” About the Greater Roadrunner From All About Birds:
- For a generation of Americans, the familiar “beep, beep” of Warner Brothers’ cartoon Roadrunner was the background sound of Saturday mornings. Despite the cartoon character’s perennial victories over Wile E. Coyote, real-life coyotes present a real danger. The mammals can reach a top speed of 43 miles an hour—more than twice as fast as roadrunners.
- Roadrunners have evolved a range of adaptations to deal with the extremes of desert living. Like seabirds, they secrete a solution of highly concentrated salt through a gland just in front of each eye, which uses less water than excreting it via their kidneys and urinary tract. Moisture-rich prey including mammals and reptiles supply them otherwise-scarce water in their diet. Both chicks and adults flutter the unfeathered area beneath the chin (gular fluttering) to dissipate heat.
- Greater Roadrunners eat poisonous prey, including venomous lizards and scorpions, with no ill effect, although they’re careful to swallow horned lizards head-first with the horns pointed away from vital organs. Roadrunners can also kill and eat rattlesnakes, often in tandem with another roadrunner: as one distracts the snake by jumping and flapping, the other sneaks up and pins its head, then bashes the snake against a rock. If it’s is too long to swallow all at once, a roadrunner will walk around with a length of snake still protruding from its bill, swallowing it a little at a time as the snake digests.
- Based on banding records, the oldest roadrunner was at least 7 years old.
- Roadrunners hold a special place in Native American and Mexican legends and belief systems. The birds were revered for their courage, strength, speed, and endurance. The roadrunner’s distinctive X-shaped footprint—with two toes pointing forward and two backward—are used as sacred symbols by Pueblo tribes to ward off evil. The X shape disguises the direction the bird is heading, and is thought to prevent evil spirits from following.