Lagonosticta senegala
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~20% in a week ~40%
The red-billed firefinch or Senegal firefinch (Lagonosticta senegala) is a small seed-eating bird in the family Estrildidae. This is a resident breeding bird in most of Sub-Saharan Africa with an estimated global extent of occurrence of 10,000,000 km2. It was introduced to Egypt, but the population there has become extinct. It was also introduced to southern Algeria where it is currently expanding northward.
In 1760 the French zoologist Mathurin Jacques Brisson included a description of the red-billed firefinch in his Ornithologie based on a specimen collected in Senegal. He used the French name Le Sénégali rouge and the Latin name Senegalus Ruber. Although Brisson coined Latin names, these do not conform to the binomial system and are not recognised by the International Commission on Zoological Nomenclature. When in 1766 the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus updated his Systema Naturae for the twelfth edition, he added 240 species that had been previously described by Brisson. One of these was the red-billed firefinch. Linnaeus included a brief description, coined the binomial name Fringilla senegala and cited Brisson's work. The species is now placed in the genus Lagonosticta... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ouagadougou | 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso | |
| 2 | Serrekunda | 🇬🇲 Gambia | |
| 3 | Mombasa | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 4 | Dakar | 🇸🇳 Senegal | |
| 5 | Maiduguri | 🇳🇬 Nigeria | |
| 6 | Nairobi | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 7 | Addis Ababa | 🇪🇹 Ethiopia | |
| 8 | Kigali | 🇷🇼 Rwanda | |
| 9 | Harare | 🇿🇼 Zimbabwe | |
| 10 | Kampala | 🇺🇬 Uganda |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | San Diego Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 2 | Skansen | 🇸🇪 Sweden | |
| 3 | Nuremberg Zoo | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 4 | Tiergarten Am Tiergarten 28 in Nürnberg | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 5 | Adelaide Zoo | 🇦🇺 Australia | |
| 6 | Hann Forest and Zoological Park | 🇸🇳 Senegal | |
| 7 | Zoo Boise | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 8 | Cambridge Butterfly Conservatory | 🇨🇦 Canada | |
| 9 | Helsingborgs Djur- och Lekpark | 🇸🇪 Sweden | |
| 10 | Baltic Sea Science Center | 🇸🇪 Sweden | |
| 11 | Key West Butterfly and Nature Conservatory | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 12 | Tiergarten Am Tiergarten 12 in Nürnberg | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 13 | Tiergarten Am Tiergarten 14 in Nürnberg | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 14 | Tiergarten Am Tiergarten 6 in Nürnberg | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 15 | Butterfly World | 🇺🇸 United States |
With luck
About 10% of wildlife watchers report a Red-billed Firefinch sighting in Lubango on a given day, based on 6 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 22nd most-seen of the 35 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 20%, and over a week to about 40%, if each day is a fresh chance.
January and February
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Red-billed Firefinch in Lubango on a given day, against under 5% in March and July–October, the lowest months. Those are among Lubango's wettest months, with about 130 mm of rain a month against almost none in June. April–June and November–December have too few records to rate.
Between 10 am and 1 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Red-billed Firefinch sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
17th of 21
Of the 21 cities where we can rate Red-billed Firefinch sightings, Lubango ranks 17th at about 10%. The best odds are in Ouagadougou (Burkina Faso, about 70%), Serrekunda (Gambia, about 60%) and Mombasa (Kenya, about 50%).
Same family: Estrildidae
The closest relatives of the Red-billed Firefinch that you can see in Lubango (family Estrildidae, Waxbills and Allies) are Blue-breasted Cordonbleu (about 20%) and Bronze Mannikin (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Red-billed Firefinch is recorded against all the birds logged in Lubango (6 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.
