Red-billed Quelea
The voracious Red-billed Quelea The male has a red beak. The female is beige and has a black stripe on its face. Outside the breeding season, the male looks similar, but during the breeding season its face has black feathers...
The gluttonous Red-billed Quelea
The male has a red beak. The female is beige and has a black stripe on its face. The male looks similar outside of the breeding season, but during the breeding season it has black feathers on its face and red breeding and crown feathers. The short beak is grey or silver.
The Red-billed Quelea lives with its conspecifics in large flocks. Even breeding takes place in flocks. They mainly live in steppes and savannas, but also seek proximity to humans. To find food, they cover quite large distances every day. They live to be two to three years old.
Habitat
The Red-billed Quelea is mainly found south of the Sahara. However, they are not present in some parts of South Africa and in rainforest areas. They are particularly widespread in Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Chad, Congo, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mali, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, Senegal, Somalia, Sudan, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Zimbabwe. They are so gluttonous. When searching for food, they also raid the rice and grain fields of farmers. That is why they are not particularly popular there and are sometimes fought against. This is understandable, of course, if they take the seed from the fields and destroy the harvest. Nevertheless, it is not an endangered bird. It inhabits about 9,400,000 square meters. It has not yet been determined in which area most of them are found. To search for food, they cover long distances every day. Their migrations go as far as Djibouti.
Breeding
The Red-billed Quelea is now often kept in aviaries. This does not pose a major problem. In the warm season, it quickly adapts to its new surroundings. A male can be kept with several females and other weavers or waxbills in one aviary. In summer, they live well in a garden aviary. In winter, however, they must be kept in a heated and protected room. Breeding is also easy. They quickly build their nests, which they usually hang in the bars of the aviary. They often also accept nesting baskets and nest boxes. While they can basically be fed well with usual exotic mixtures, they should also receive germinated and green food from time to time. They also eat insects. However, animal food is essential when raising the young.
