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Transcription
1210
Brock says one boy says that he sees two in the neighborhood and
that one "has red on it and the other has not". (Archie's red
was much more conspicuous and deeper in hue than T's.
5:30 P.M. I have just returned from there.
Shortly after arrival, about 2:45, a roadrunner was seen in the lot
west of the house mentioned.* While Brock waited and watched, I
approached it slowly. It did not retreat. When I was about 30
feet from it I tossed a worm part way to it. It came at once and
got it. I knelt on one knee and showed the worm box, suggesting
that it come and get more worms. It came at once and took worms
from hand freely. I suggested that it come up on to my knee, which
it did. Next I produced some hamburger steak which it ate hungrily.
When it lost interest and showed a tendency to wander off
I produced a very small mouse. This, as with all other offerings,
it took from hand tamely. From the first sight of it, even before
I had tossed the first worm, I was certain that it was Archie and
had been calling him by that name. Archie it was because of known
scars on beak and back of head. But an Archie that has encountered
trouble since, with fresh scars added to the old. His eyes
have lost the gentle, soft appearance of earlier days and look
wild, though he is tame. He is still smaller than Rhody, I judge.
He went up into a low pepper tree and I called Brock--who had
watched all that went before--to join me. Archie, though nervous,
did not retreat. As a test to give an indication of whether
Archie would distinguish between Brock and me, i.e. remember me
in a special sense, I asked Brock to offer him the remaining mouse.
(He is more accustomed to wild birds than I am). Archie edged away
on his limb. I then took the mouse and offered it to him, and he
accepted it at once, even advancing for it.
Just before this, it should have been noted, I had made a test
to see if Archie would follow me when I retreated and called,
finding that he would.
He next went up into the garden of one of the houses and was
relocated above a rock-garden on a sloping bank. A test was made
to determine if he would come down to me across the garden, on
solicitation. He did, and I secured a movie of him as a record.
He finally went up about 8 feet into a eucalyptus tree and disposed
himself in road-runner fashion, with tail flattened against
the trunk, as if for the night, where we left him about 4:30.
If not his night roost, it at least meets the road-runner specification
of a wide outlook to the west, good landing field and
protection from the rear.
He had eaten 4 good sized pieces of hamburger, two small mice
and a dozen or so meal worms. He should have had enough for the
rest of the day, and although rather early, it seems probable that
he had called it a day.
10:15 P.M. Well it was Archie's roost for this night at any
rate, for I went over to see him about 8:30 and he had not moved
a fraction of an inch, as far as I could see. I introduced myself
at the house in the garden of which he was and was most
courteously received by Miss Georgiana Melvin, a teacher at Mills.
I took her out and showed Archie to her, much to her delight.
Miss Melvin introduced me to her neighbor on the south: Dean H.B.
Ege (6015 Majestic Ave.) formerly of Mills, and her neighbor to
the north, Mrs. Wild (H.G.), whose husband is or was also of the
Mills faculty. All are pleased to have Archie as a neighbor and
will try to protect him, but there are boys in the neighborhood
that have tried to shoot him. I was given some of the names and
will look them up and try to enlist them on A's side.
* I called: "Archie"! It stopped at once and looked about.