Pseudonigrita arnaudi
Silhouette: Sheatherius · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~30%
The grey-capped social weaver (Pseudonigrita arnaudi) is a sparrow-like liver-colored bird, with a pale grey crown, a dark grey bill, a whitish eye-ring, horn-colored legs, with some black in the wing and a light terminal band in the tail, that builds roofed nests made of straws, breeds in colonies in thorny Acacia trees, and feeds in groups gathering grass seeds and insects. Male and female have near identical plumage. DNA-analysis confirms it is part of the weaver family. It is found in Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda.
The French naturalist Charles Lucien Bonaparte described the grey-capped social weaver as Nigrita arnaudi in 1850. He chose the specific epithet to honor Joseph Pons d'Arnaud, the French explorer who had collected a specimen around 1841 near Juba on the White Nile, and sent it to the French Museum of Natural History. In 1903, the German zoologist Anton Reichenow assigned the species to his newly erected genus Pseudonigrita, because he considered P. arnaudi and P. cabanisi related to weaverbirds (Ploceidae), while the other species Nigrita bicolor, N. canicapillus, N. fusconota and N. luteifrons are negrofinches assigned... Wikipedia →
| # | Park | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ruaha National Park | 🇹🇿 Tanzania | |
| 2 | Serengeti National Park | 🇹🇿 Tanzania | |
| 3 | Kidepo Valley National Park | 🇺🇬 Uganda | |
| 4 | Masai Mara National Reserve | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 5 | Ngorongoro Conservation Area | 🇹🇿 Tanzania | |
| 6 | Amboseli National Park | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 7 | Tsavo West National Park | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 8 | Nairobi National Park | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 9 | Tarangire National Park | 🇹🇿 Tanzania | |
| 10 | Samburu National Reserve | 🇰🇪 Kenya | |
| 11 | Tsavo East National Park | 🇰🇪 Kenya |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Gray-headed Social-Weaver sighting in Nairobi National Park on a given day, based on 85 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data from 2019 to 2026. It is the 228th most-seen of the 371 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 30%, if each day is a fresh chance.
January–March, May–June and August
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Gray-headed Social-Weaver in Nairobi National Park on a given day, against under 5% in April, July and September–December, the lowest months.
Between 11 am and 2 pm
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Gray-headed Social-Weaver sightings with a recorded time, and about 8 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
8th of 11
Of the 11 parks where we can rate Gray-headed Social-Weaver sightings, Nairobi National Park ranks 8th at under 5%. The best odds are in Ruaha National Park (Tanzania, about 50%), Serengeti National Park (Tanzania, about 40%) and Kidepo Valley National Park (Uganda, about 20%). All parks ranked.
Same family: Passeridae
The closest relatives of the Gray-headed Social-Weaver that you can see in Nairobi National Park (family Passeridae, Old World Sparrows) are Kenya Rufous Sparrow (about 60%), White-browed Sparrow-Weaver (about 50%) and Yellow-spotted Petronia (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Gray-headed Social-Weaver is recorded against all the birds logged in Nairobi National Park (85 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.
