Tuesday, May 10, 2011

Our very own Roadrunner no coyote

We have a roadrunner that lives in our front yard.  Well, we think he lives in a tree near the driveway.  He works hard running back and forth from my garden with delectable, very large items in his beak to feed his brood.  I say he.  I have no idea if he is a he, or if there are two of them working the field.  I know very little about roadrunners. But likely there are two of them brooding some chicks nearby. They are very fun to watch.

I know my grandson thought it was just the coolest thing EVER to see one run across the road in front of our car when he was here visiting a few years ago.  Ever since, every time he is here, he looks for a roadrunner.  And every time, he sees one, or two, and he is absolutely delighted.  I suppose he is looking for Wily Coyote to be ambling along after the funny bird with  his tail on fire or something equally drastic.

I looked up Roadrunners and found some interesting information.  I mean, I wondered just exactly what he was foraging for in my precious vegetable garden.  Turns out, they are great bug hunters, scorpion killers, small rodent eaters, and snake lovers, even will pair up and go for the big snakes, as their favorite delectable.  A part of the cuckoo family - I love the fact that I have a family of cuckoos living in my yard.  Perfect.

They can run at speeds of up to 26 miles per hour!  Even my dog doesn't bother them when they are tearing across the yard with their booty in beak, often stopping to check out their surroundings, coming ever closer to the door and my front porch. 

A cache of 3-6 eggs take twenty days to hatch, and then fledge the nest in another 18 days.  So I figure this batch of babies will be running around the yard in another week or so.  I wonder if they will follow their parents up to my garden for dinnertime, or if they are on their own once they take their first trot out and get up to speed. 

The Hopi Indians believed the roadrunner provided protection against evil spirits.  Some frontier folks believed roadrunners led lost people to trails.  Makes sense.  They probably made those trails.
I'm enamored with my yard cuckoo bird.  I can't wait to see the babies run.


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