Passer luteus
Silhouette: Andrew Butko (modified) · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~90% in a week >90%
The Sudan golden sparrow (Passer luteus) is a small species of bird in the sparrow family found in sub-Saharan Africa. It is a famous cage bird, and in aviculture, it is known as the golden song sparrow. The Arabian golden sparrow and this species are sometimes considered one species, as the "golden sparrow".
This species was first described by Martin Lichtenstein in 1823, as Fringilla lutea, from a specimen collected at Dongola, Sudan. Since then it has generally been placed in the genus Passer. The species name luteus means saffron yellow in Latin.
The two golden sparrows are very similar, and have often been treated as the same species. Both are similar to the chestnut sparrow, and all three may once have been only clinally different. The male Arabian golden sparrow is almost entirely gold-coloured, the male chestnut sparrow is mostly chestnut, and the male Sudan golden sparrow is intermediate. British ornithologist Richard Meinertzhagen considered even the chestnut sparrow to be conspecific, though the range of the Sudan golden sparrow overlaps with that of the chestnut sparrow without any known interbreeding in a small area of Darfur. The three species...
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary | 🇸🇳 Senegal |
More parks will be added in future updates.
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dakar | 🇸🇳 Senegal |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wilhelma | 🇩🇪 Germany | |
| 2 | Bloedel Conservatory | 🇨🇦 Canada |
Likely
About 50% of wildlife watchers report a Sudan Golden Sparrow sighting in Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary on a given day, based on 88 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 46th most-seen of the 173 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 90%, and over a week to over 90%, if each day is a fresh chance.
April
In that month about 70% of wildlife watchers report a Sudan Golden Sparrow in Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary on a given day, against about 30% in November, the lowest month. That is one of Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary's driest months, with almost no rain against 55 mm in August. May to October have too few records to rate.
Between 3 and 6 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Sudan Golden Sparrow sightings with a recorded time, and nearly all of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
Only Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary, in our data
Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary is the only park on Wallace's Line with enough records to rate Sudan Golden Sparrow sightings: about 50% of wildlife watchers there report one on a given day.
Same genus: Passer
The closest relatives of the Sudan Golden Sparrow that you can see in Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary (genus Passer, True Sparrows) are House Sparrow (about 20%) and Northern Grey-headed Sparrow (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Sudan Golden Sparrow is recorded against all the birds logged in Djoudj National Bird Sanctuary (88 verified sightings from 2019 to 2026), 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.
