BIBDS OF NOETH AND MIDDLE AMEEICA. 75 



that of the lower back, rump, and under parts of body blended, soft 

 hair-like; orbital and post-orbital regions naked; eyelashes strongly 

 developed; feathers of fore part of head with distinct slender bristly, 

 but not antrorse, tips, those immediately above nostrils semi-erect 

 and semi-antrorse, those of chin also semi-antrorse, recurved; occip- 

 ital feathers elongated, forming a conspicuous erectile crest. Color 

 above mainly bronzy (becoming glossy blue- or violet-black on 

 hindneck and pileum) conspicuously streaked (the feathers edged 

 with white and pale buffy brownish) ; f oreneck and chest pale buffy 

 brownish streaked with black; under parts of body plain dull whitish; 

 lateral rectrices blue-black (under surface of inner web mostly 

 grayish), broadly tipped with white; sexes alike and young not mate- 

 rially different. 



Range. — More southern arid portions of western United States and 

 southward over dryer parts of Mexico to northern Nicaragua. (Two 

 species.) 



KEY TO THE SPECIES OF GEOCOCCYX. 



a. Larger (wing 162-196, tail 260-316), whole foreneck and chest conspicuously 

 streaked; under parts of body dull grayish white, the under tail-coverts similar. 

 (Southwestern United States and southward to States of Jalisco, Mexico, Puebla, 



and Vera Cruz, Mexico.) Geococcyx caliiornianus (p. 75). 



aa. Smaller (wing 136.5-162, tail 231-305); foreneck and chest unstreaked medially; 

 under parts of body deep buff; under tail-coverts dusky. (Southern Mexico, 

 from States of Sinaloa, Vera Cruz, Yucatan, etc., southward to northern Nic- 

 aragua.) Geococcyx affinis (p. 80). 



GEOCOCCYX CALIFORNIANUS (Lesson). 



ROADRUNNER. 



Adults (sexes alike). — Feathers of forehead and anterior part of 

 crown black or blue-black mesially, each with a broad lateral spot (ex- 

 tending to edge) of russet or light tawny-brown, often edged with pale 

 grayish buffy or buffy grayish, the rest of pileum (including occipital 

 bushy crest) slightly glossy black or blue-black, mostly uniform, but 

 more or less broken, especially on posterior part of crown by edgings 

 of tawny-brown and pale buffy; hindneck and upper back black or 

 blue-black, the feathers broadly edged with light tawny-brown 

 passing into dull buffy whitish on edges, producing a conspicuously 

 streaked or semi-squamate effect; feathers of lower back, scapulars, 

 and wing-coverts similarly marked, but the central area of each 

 feather olive (more or less dark), glossed with bronzy or bronze- 

 greenish, and edged with black, the paler markings on wing-coverts 

 larger and paler, in form of lateral ovoid longitudinal spots; greater 

 coverts olive glossed with bronze, and with a large terminal spot of 

 white on each web; proximal secondaries olivaceous, glossed with 

 bronze or bronze-greenish edged narrowly with black, and broadly mar- 



