Sounds and Vocal Behavior

The song of Scissor-tailed Nightjar is described as "a prolonged sequence of tsips ....., one note per second just like a cricket, sometimes for minutes on end" (Sick 1993) and as "a thin, peeping ti" (Lane, in Schulenberg et al. 2010).

For a representative audio recording with sonogram, see audio

This song sometimes is accompanied by "a low raspy rhi rhi-grrr", which may be a separate vocalization or perhaps is a mechanical sound (Lane, in Schulenberg et al. 2010). The song is given both when perched ("perched crosswise on a small branch or other substrate") or in flight, at dusk and dawn (Sick 1993).

Calls of Scissor-tailed Nightjar include a flight call, described as "an extremely high tsig (in flight), sounding like [the] voice of a cricket or bat" (Sick 1993), a low clucking sound, and a low growl that occasionally terminates in a croak (given by a wounded bird, possibly as an attempt to startle a predator; Wetmore 1926).

Additional audio recordings of vocalizations of Scissor-tailed Nightjar can be heard at Macaualay Library, at xeno-canto, and at Internet Bird Collection.

Belton (1984) described a display during the male, while perched on the ground, produces a snapping sound with the wings. The male stretches the wings almost straight up, then closes them rapidly, producing a series of up to five "rapidly repeated sounds between a thump and a snap".

Wetmore (1926) reported that this nightjar flushes with a "rattle of wings", although Belton (1984) describes them as silent when flushed. Sick (1993) describes another sound that he belived was produced by the wings, a muffled beat or "a ruffle (bo, bo, bo, bo, bo ...)", produced when in fast pursuit of another individual, or sometimes when on the ground (Sick 1993).