Riparia paludicola
Silhouette: Andy Wilson · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~20%
The brown-throated martin, brown-throated sand martin or plain martin (Riparia paludicola) is a small passerine bird in the swallow family, Hirundinidae, that is widely distributed across Africa. It was formerly regarded as conspecific with the grey-throated martin (Riparia chinensis) and the Madagascar martin (Riparia cowani).
The brown-throated martin was formally described in 1817 by the French ornithologist Louis Pierre Vieillot. He placed it in the genus Hirundo and coined the binomial name Hirundo paludicola. The specific epithet paludicola is Latin meaning "marsh-dweller" (from palus, paludis meaning "swamp" and -cola meaning "dweller". Vieillot based his account on "L'hirondelle à front roux" from South Africa that had been described and illustrated in 1806 by François Levaillant. The brown-throated martin is now one of six martins placed in the genus Riparia that was introduced in 1817 by the German naturalist Johann Reinhold Forster. It was formerly considered to be conspecific with the grey-throated martin (Riparia chinensis) and the Madagascar martin (Riparia cowani).
Six subspecies are recognised. They differ in size and plumage tones of the upperparts... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nairobi | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 2 | Antananarivo | 🇲🇬 Madagascar | |
| 3 | Cape Town | 🇿🇦 South Africa | |
| 4 | Johannesburg | 🇿🇦 South Africa | |
| 5 | Addis Ababa | 🇪🇹 Ethiopia | |
| 6 | Durban | 🇿🇦 South Africa | |
| 7 | Marrakesh | 🇲🇦 Morocco | |
| 8 | Pretoria | 🇿🇦 South Africa | |
| 9 | Kampala | 🇺🇬 Uganda |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Plain Martin sighting in Johannesburg on a given day, based on 127 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 96th most-seen of the 219 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 20%, if each day is a fresh chance.
April, July and September
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Plain Martin in Johannesburg on a given day, against under 5% in May–June, August and October–March, the lowest months. Those are among Johannesburg's driest months, with about 20 mm of rain a month against 130 mm in December.
Between 9 am and noon
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Plain Martin sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
4th of 9
Of the 9 cities where we can rate Plain Martin sightings, Johannesburg ranks 4th at under 5%. The best odds are in Nairobi (Kenya, about 10%), Antananarivo (Madagascar, about 10%) and Cape Town (South Africa, about 10%).
Same family: Hirundinidae
The closest relatives of the Plain Martin that you can see in Johannesburg (family Hirundinidae, Swallows and Martins) are Greater Striped-Swallow (about 20%), White-throated Swallow (about 10%) and Rock Martin (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Plain Martin is recorded against all the birds logged in Johannesburg (127 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
