Geococcyx -- the roadrunner revisited

   Recently, on this forum, were brief discussions of
the roadrunner, and I made a note to go to my files,
to see if additional material could be useful.
L.M. Larson, 1930. Osteology of the California
road-runner Recent and Pleistocene. Univ. California
Publications in Zoology 32(4):409-428
Wayne Meinzer, 1993. The roadrunner (Texas Tech
University Press), 104pp
Janice M. Hughes, 1996. Greater roadrunner: Geococcyx
californianus. The birds of North America # 244
(American Ornithologists' Union/Academy of Natural
Sciences [Philadelphia]), 24pp
   Perhaps not germane, but, before his death, the
artist Marcel Delgado told me that, when he designed
the tyrannosaur for Willis O'Brien, there were two
versions: the one in the 1933 film (the only surviving
footage from the 1932 test reel, now lost), and a
refurbished model, with tail elevated above the ground
and back horizontal, an s-shaped neck supporting the
massive head (both based on Charles R. Knight's AMNH
mural).  Marcel took one photograph of the second
version, with the Kong 18 inch high puppet standing
beside the theropod, a log in its hand. OBie called it
a "roadrunner from hell", and wanted to refilm the
fight with the impossibly bipedal primate. Of course,
this never came to pass (RKO was near bankruptcy), and
all that remains is the photograph. Interestingly
enough, the 1933 tyrannosaur is nearly toothless.

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