Since we moved to southern Missouri, we have been fascinated with an unexpected variety of wildlife. Yes. I am talking about the nemesis of one Wile E. Coyote. When I was young, I sympathized a bit with Wile E. However, having shot at and missed one of his brethren that was killing my chickens by waiting in the yard for the coop door to open, I have changed my mind. Now that we have spent time with the roadrunners, we are definitely on Team Roadrunner.

That’s right. We have roadrunners. The Missouri Department of Conservation has written about them and their arrival in the 1950s. You can find good pictures of them on the internet… not just the one of our famous friend from Loony Tunes.

As I mentioned, we get thrilled every time we see one. However, this July we have learned even more through observation. After I finally cut the three-foot tall grass in the fields by the gated entrance to our palatial estate, we noticed that two of them were running around that side of the property. While I was building a new sheep pen, I found myself mesmerized by them in between pounding the posts into the rock. One in particular seemed to be on a quest…

Above is an example of a bad picture of a roadrunner. As it turns out, roadrunners are very shy, and it is difficult to catch a good picture of one, especially on our phones. You, the eager and excited reader, can not see it in Tiffany’s picture, but I found the birds running around picking up sticks and piles of grass. To my complete and utter surprise, I discovered that they were building a nest in one of our cedar trees. We currently only have one cedar that I have trimmed. I have essentially removed the branches that whack me in the face when mowing. I don’t know if that made a difference to them, but there are plenty of other trees that seem to provide more cover.

At any rate, I never would have suspected that they would want to nest up in a tree when they appear to spend the rest of their lives as ground birds.

The bobwhites have indicated they feel it is an insult to their class of avians.

Update from the future:

Apparently, one of the roadrunners read this post and felt bad about their behavior. I stopped in the driveway on the Gator, and this one ran right out on the road, and just sat there waiting for me to snap a few pictures with my phone. The only thing it didn’t do for me was put up its crest, but I like the picture anyway!