But I've never heard him beep!

By Pat Gibson

In all the 17 years I've lived here in Central Texas, I have never heard a roadrunner beep. Now in all the cartoons, the speedy roadrunner always beeps at the coyote. The closest I've ever heard a roadrunner come to beeping is the castenet-like call he makes with his beak.

The roadrunner is a member of the cuckoo family and his call really does sound like a string of coos. Roger Tory Peterson says that they are descending and end usually like a dove call. There are other cuckoos in the area, the black and the yellow beaked. All give a call similar to the call of the European cuckoo of clock fame. How anyone could take the cascade of coos and get a beep like an old car horn is beyond me. I also have never seen our native roadrunner outrun a train or a car. In fact, occasionally on the road you will see the remains of a roadrunner that tried and failed.

The roadrunner is a very striking bird. The feathers are speckled with black and white and they raise them at strange angles when is alarmed or curious. If you can manage to get close enough, the male has spots of dark navy blue on his wings. Both the male and female have scruffy looking crests that they raise when they stand still, which isn't often.

The roadrunner has a fierce reputation. He is known for killing lizard and mice but there are stories of attacks on rattlesnakes. I have seen a roadrunner with a small snake in its beak, but never a rattler. Very reliable observers have reported seeing a bird harass a rattler until the snake is obviously exhausted. Then the bird can use its large hard bill to attack and kill the snake. They are eaters of rodents and reptiles and should be protected.

The yellow-billed cuckoo is what I call the spotted tail cuckoo. The bill is yellow underneath but the white spots on his tail are much easier to see. The under wings are a rich russet brown. The spots are half circles of pure white down the outside of the tail. The call of this bird is closer to the traditional cuckoo. It is a series of sharp kuk, kuks. The black billed cuckoo is not as noticeable but the call is closest to the European bird. It is a series of identifiable coos that rise and fall in a pattern we have come to associate with the cuckoo clock.

When I was a teenager, we lived in Germany. A close friend, whose grandfather had emigrated from Germany, recorded the song of the European cuckoo as a Christmas present. Her grandmother wrote back and said he listened over and over and cried. As we grow older, sounds and smells remind us of memories. Perhaps the castanets call of the roadrunner is a memory for you.

I remember a dog we had once that tried to chase the roadrunners and bugs and shadows, but that's another story.