Greater Roadrunner Overview, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology (2024)

FAQs

Greater Roadrunner Overview, All About Birds, Cornell Lab of Ornithology? ›

Basic Description. 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

It can be seen regularly in the US states of California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, and Oklahoma, and less frequently in Kansas, Louisiana, Arkansas, and Missouri, as well as the Mexican states of Baja California, Baja California Sur, Sonora, Sinaloa, Chihuahua, Durango, Jalisco, Coahuila, ...

"Roadrunners and humans make remarkable friends," Cornett says. "They seem to like being around us." Like some people, they might have motives. "We're big, and as we walk through the desert we scare up a lot of insects for them to eat," Cornett said.

The roadrunners (genus Geococcyx), also known as chaparral birds or chaparral co*cks, are two species of fast-running ground cuckoos with long tails and crests. They are found in the southwestern and south-central United States, Mexico and Central America, usually in the desert.

Similar SpeciesScaled Quail

Scaled Quail share the Greater Roadrunner's desert habitat, but are much smaller and shorter-legged, with a plain back and wings and a heavily scaled belly (roadrunners have unmarked bellies).

They are, however, intelligent creatures and are quite curious about human activity, often shaking their tail from side to side as they try to figure out what we humans are doing. These crow-sized predators are skillful hunters and are not picky about what they eat.

Unlike most birds with which we are familiar, a roadrunner runs rather than flies, readily embraces humans and, as a predator, feeds on some of the most unappetizing animals imaginable including scorpions, black widows and rattlesnakes.

We ap- proached the Roadrunner, which ran a short distance and dropped its prey-a Black-chinned Humming- bird that died in less than a minute. We speculate that the Roadrunner caught this hummingbird by jumping into the air from the ground.

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.

On cool desert nights, roadrunners enter a state of torpor, allowing their body temperature to drop to conserve their energy. 6 To recover from their cold night of slumber, roadrunners spend the morning lying out in the sunlight, with their feathers raised to allow the sun to reach their skin.

Do roadrunners mate for life? ›

Greater roadrunner pairs may mate for life. A male greater roadrunners put on displays to tempt a female to mate.

Roadrunners have an average life expectancy of seven to eight years. Habitat/Range: The roadrunner inhabits open, flat or rolling terrain with scattered cover of dry brush. They also inhabit chaparral, desert scrub, and woodlands in the southwestern part of the United States.

Roadrunners are mostly meat eaters. Small snakes, lizards, toads, are prime fare; they will eat insects and mice too if they can catch them. Occasionally they will eat some plants, things like cactus fruits.

In terms of appearance, there is little sexual dimorphism between males and females. Both grow up to 23 inches in length and look primarily the same, each covered in brown feathers with streaks of white on the body and wings, a white edging along the tail, and a patch of red and blue skin around the eyes.

Feeds on many large insects, plus other arthropods including scorpions, tarantulas, and centipedes. Also catches many lizards, snakes, mice, young ground squirrels, small birds (including baby quail and adult sparrows), sometimes snails.

Group Name: Marathon. Average Life Span: Up to eight years.

Overview: Perhaps the world's rarest bird, only one Stresemann's Bristlefront is known to survive in the wild. Unfortunately, this bird is confined to one of the most fragmented and degraded – and vulnerable – forests in the Americas.

Greater roadrunners are not federally listed as threatened or endangered. However Southern California has seen a significant drop in roadrunner numbers over the past few decades.

That's only 2.3% of total production. In 1970, the Road Runner's second and last year with a convertible version, deliveries dropped to less than 2%, with only 658 units sold. As a result, combing the convertible body style with the 426-cubic-inch (7.0-liter) HEMI results in the rarest Road Runner ever produced.