Lark-like bunting (Vaalstreepkoppie)

Scientific name: Emberiza impetuani 

A rather plain, nondescript bunting. Head sandy brown with darker brown streaking on crown and a distinctive broad buffy supercilium ("eyebrow").
It generally prefers arid, open shrubland, desert grassland, dry watercourses, sparse grassland or shrubland on rocky ridges, eroded gullies, road verges and occasionally gardens of Karoo villages.
It mainly eats grass seeds, foraging on bare ground with scattered shrubs and stones.

Southern double-collared sunbird (Klein-rooibandsuikerbekkie)

Scientific name: Cinnyris chalybeus

The adult male has a glossy, metallic green head, throat upper breast and back. It has a brilliant red band across the chest, separated from the green breast by a narrow metallic blue band. The rest of the underparts are whitish. When displaying, yellow feather tufts can be seen on the shoulders. As with other sunbirds the bill is long and decurved. The bill, legs and feet are black. The eye is dark brown. The male can be distinguished from the similar greater double-collared sunbird by its smaller size, narrower red chest band and shorter bill.
Endemic to southern Africa, occurring from the far south of Namibia to South Africa, with the bulk of its population centered around the Western Cape.
It generally prefers fynbos and Karoo shrubland, woodland, Afromontane forest, gardens and Eucalyptus plantations.
It mainly feeds on nectar, supplemented with athropods, gleaning prey from vegetation and spider webs and hawking insects aerially.

Malachite sunbird (Jangroentjie)

Scientific name: Nectarinia famosa

The breeding male malachite sunbird, which has very long central tail feathers, is 25 cm long, and the shorter-tailed female 15 cm. The adult male is metallic green when breeding, with blackish-green wings with small yellow pectoral patches. In non-breeding (eclipse) plumage, the male's upperparts are brown apart from the green wings and tail, the latter retaining the elongated feathers. The underparts in eclipse plumage are yellow, flecked with green.
Here it occurs along the West coast of South Africa bordering on Namibia, extending east through the Eastern Cape and Lesotho to KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and the Limpopo Province. It occurs in a variety of habitats, ranging from alpine and montane grasslands to scrubby hillsides in mountainous areas, as well as in arid steppes of Namaqualand, riverine thornbush, gardens, parks and alien plantations.
Its diet is mainly made up of nectar supplemented with small Arthropods. It usually forages singly or in pairs, but it may aggregate in groups of over 100 at localised food sources.

Cape rock-thrush (Kaapse kliplyster)

Scientific name: Monticola rupestris

Cape Rock-thrush

Sentinal Rock-thrush

The summer male has a blue-grey head, orange underparts and outer tail feathers, and brown wings and back. Females have a brown head, but their underparts are a much richer orange than those of other female rock thrushes. The outer tail feathers are reddish, like the male's. The male Sentinel Rock-Thrush is similar to the male Cape Rock Thrush, but the blue grey of the head extends to the back and upper breast. The male Short-toed Rock-Thrush has a blue-grey back and a whitish crown.
Endemic to South Africa, Swaziland and Lesotho, generally preferring cliffs, rocky valleys, boulder-strewn hillsides and scree slopes, especially with scattered trees, bushes and succulents (such as Aloe and Euphorbia). It also occupies villages and towns adjacent to these habitats.
It mainly eats arthropods, fruit and seeds, doing most of its foraging on the ground within vegetation or between rocks.

Fiscal flycatcher (Fiskaalvlieëvanger)

Scientific name: Sigelus silens

The fiscal flycatcher is 17–20 cm in length. The adult male is black above and white below with white wing patches and white sides to the tail. The female is brown, not black, above. The juvenile is like the female but duller and with brown spots and scalloping above and below. The male can be confused with the comman fiscal shrike, but the shrike has a heavy hooked bill, a white patch on the shoulder and a white wing pathe.
Endemic to southern Africa, occurring from south-eastern Botswana and the extreme south of Mozambique to Swaziland and South Africa. It generally favours open habitats with scattered trees or bushes to use as perches, such as moist and semi-arid grassland, fynbos, Nama Karoo, valley bushveld, scrub Acacia and kloof bush in highveld. It is most common in ecotones between two habitats; one with fairly dense thicket used for nesting and another with large patches of open ground for foraging.
It mainly eats small insects supplemented with fruit, doing most of its foraging from a high perch, pouncing on prey on the ground and occasionally hawking prey aerially. It may occasionally be seen in large mixed-species foraging flocks, especially at termite alate emergences and where there are half asleep (torpid) ants on the ground.

Cape Bulbul (Kaapse tiptol)

Scientific name: Pycnonotus capensis

The Cape bulbul is 19–21 cm long, mainly dull, blackish brown with a diagnostic white eye-ring, and yellow undertail coverts. The head has a small crest. The short, straight bill, legs and feet are black and the iris is dark brown. The sexes are similar in plumage.
Endemic to South Africa, where it is very common Across much of the Western Cape, extending along the coast to the Northern and Eastern Cape. It generally prefers thickly vegetated fynbos and succulent karoo, as well as coastal scrub, Acacia karoo (Sweet thorn) woodland, suburban parks and gardens.
It mainly eats fruit, supplemented with arthropods, seeds and nectar. It usually forages in pairs or small groups, plucking fruit from the foliage of trees and bushes, while occasionally hawking invertebrate prey.

Sombre bulbul (Gewone willie)

Scientific name: Andropadus importunus 

The sombre greenbul is 15–18 cm long, with mainly dull greyish olive-green plumage, paler on the underparts than above. It has a white iris. The sexes are similar in plumage, but juveniles are even duller than the adult and have dark eyes.
It generally prefers coastal scrub and forest, or well-wooded valleys further inland. It also occupies thornveld, dry woodland thickets along drainage lines in the Karoo and gardens in well-wooded suburbs.
It eats mainly eats fruit, foraging in the foliage of trees and bushes, regularly singing its distinctive call.

White-rumped swift (Witkruiswindswael)

Scientific name: Apus caffer

This 14-15.5 cm long species has, like its relatives, a short forked tail and long swept-back wings that resemble a crescent or a boomerang. It is entirely dark except for a pale throat patch and a narrow white rump. It is similar to the closely related little swift, but is slimmer, darker and has a more forked tail and a narrower white rump.
Swifts have very short legs that they use only for clinging to vertical surfaces. They never settle voluntarily on the ground, and spend most of their lives in the air, feeding on insects that they catch in their beaks. They drink on the wing.
 In southern Africa it is common in Namibia, south-eastern Botswana, Zimbabwe, Swaziland and South Africa. As it spends a large portion of its life in the air, it is not picky about what habitats it forages over, however it generally prefers savanna, forest, grassland and shrubland.
It exclusively eats insects, typically foraging aerially in mixed species flocks, along with other swift and swallow species.

846 Common Waxbill (Rooibeksysie)

Scientific name: Estrilda astrild

The common waxbill (Estrilda astrild), also known as the St Helena Waxbill is a small passerine bird belonging to the estrildid finch family. It is native to sub-Saharan Africa but has been introduced to many other regions of the world and now has an estimated global extent of occurrence of 10,000,000 km2. It is popular and easy to keep in captivity.
It is a small bird, 11 to 13 centimetres in length with a wingspan of 12 to 14 centimetres and a weight of 7 to 10 grams. It has a slender body with short rounded wings and a long graduated tail. The bright red bill of the adult is the colour of sealing wax giving the bird its name.[2] The plumage is mostly grey-brown, finely barred with dark brown. There is a red stripe through the eye and the cheeks and throat are whitish. There is often a pinkish flush to the underparts and a reddish stripe along the centre of the belly depending on the subspecies. The rump is brown and the tail and vent are dark. Females are similar to the males but are paler with less red on the belly. Juveniles are duller with little or no red on the belly, fainter dark barring and a black bill.
The common waxbill has a variety of twittering and buzzing calls and a distinctive high-pitched flight-call. The simple song is harsh and nasal and descends on the last note.
The diet consists mainly of grass seeds but insects are also eaten on occasions, especially during the breeding season when more protein is needed. The waxbills typically forage in flocks which may contain hundreds or even thousands of birds. They usually feed by clinging to the stems with their long, spindly claws and picking from the flower heads but they will also search for fallen seeds on the ground. They need to drink regularly as the seeds contain little water.

425 White-backed Mousebird (Witkruismuisvoël)

Scientific name: Colius colius

The white-backed mousebird (Colius colius) is a large species of mousebird. It is distributed in western and central regions of southern Africa from Namibia and southern Botswana eastwards to Central Transvaal and the eastern Cape.

This mousebird prefers scrubby dry habitats, such as thornveld, fynbos scrub and semi-desert.

This bird is about 34 cm (13 inches) long, with the tail comprising approximately half the length, and weighs 38–64 g (1.3–2.3 oz). The upper parts, head, prominent crest and breast are grey apart from a white back stripe flanked by two broad black stripes and a dark red, or maroon, transverse band at the base of the tail. The white is not visible unless the wings are at least partly open, such as when the birds are alighting, or sometimes in hot weather. The belly is buff in colour. The bill is bluish white with a black tip, and the legs and feet are red.

The speckled mousebird can be distinguished from this species by its differently coloured beak, legs and upperparts.

The white-backed mousebird is a frugivore which subsides on fruits, berries, leaves, seeds and nectar. It also will feed on the buds of some plants, sometimes to the extent of stripping the branches of ornamentals such as fiddlewoods. Its feeding habits make it very unpopular with fruit farmers and domestic gardeners, which might be why it is very shy as a rule. When it spots a human it either sits quiet in a tree or takes off immediately. Sometimes it will settle quietly on lawns when the grass is flowering and feed on the grass stigmata and stamens. In the wild its fruit-eating habits make it an important factor in disseminating seeds of indigenous berry-bearing plants such as Halleria lucida. However, it also spreads the seeds of invasive aliens such as Cotoneaster.

In handling mousebirds the tail should be avoided, as the long retrices come out so easily as to suggest that it is a sacrificial defence mechanism.

This is a markedly social bird, with small groups of presumably related birds feeding together and engaging in mutual preening. It roosts in groups at night. Its perching habits are amusingly parrot-like; it often almost hangs from its legs rather than squatting on them like most birds, and commonly with each leg gripping a different upright branch.

These sedentary birds may breed at any time of the year when conditions are favourable. The nest is a large cup well hidden in a thicket. Nestlings are fed by both parents and also by helpers, usually young birds from previous clutches.

The white-backed mousebird has a whistled zwee-wewit call. It also has a buzzing or crackling call that might be for alarm or keeping in contact with the group.

465 Acacia Pied Barbet (Bonthoutkapper)

Scientific name: Tricholaema leucomelas

The acacia pied barbet or pied barbet (Tricholaema leucomelas) is a species of bird in the Lybiidae family. It has a black-and-white striped head with a red forehead and yellow colouring above the eyes. It has a black bib under the chin, with a white breast and underparts. It primarily inhabits semi-arid savanna, as well as grassland, fynbos, agricultural areas and urban gardens, where it did not inhabit previously. With the introduction of alien vegetation, especially Acacia species from Australia, to regions bordering its original range, this species has been able to expand its range to these otherwise unreachable areas.[2]

It is found in Angola, Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique, Namibia, South Africa, Swaziland, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
Like most other barbets, the acacia pied barbet drills holes into dead wood to create cavity nests, like a woodpecker. It lays two to four eggs from August to April, and both sexes incubate the eggs.

The acacia pied barbet has been observed taking fruit from various trees and shrubs, such as Ficus, Rhus and Phoenix reclinata, as well as Aloe nectar and insects.

885 Cape Bunting (Rooivlerkstreepkoppie)

Scientific name: Emberiza capensis

There are a dozen subspecies, differing in plumage, but all have the distinctive head pattern and rufous in the wings. The north-eastern race E. c. vincenti is very dark above, and slaty below. It has reduced chestnut on the wing coverts. It is now usually raised to species status as Vincent's bunting, Emberiza vincenti, however some taxonomists still consider it to be conspecific.
The Cape bunting is 16 cm long. The adult has a black crown, white supercilium and black-bordered white ear coverts. The upperparts are grey brown with some dark streaks, and the wing coverts are chestnut. The tail is darker chestnut, and the underparts are grey with a pale throat. The sexes are very similar, but females may have a buff tone to the white head markings. Young birds have duller chestnut wings, a less distinct head pattern, and heavier streaking extending on to the breast and flanks. The call is an ascending zzoo-zeh-zee-zee. The song is a loud chirping chup chup chup chup chee chhep chu. E. c. vincenti has a simple tre-re-ret tre-re-ret song.
The Cape bunting occurs in southern Africa from south-western Angola, eastern Zambia, Zimbabwe and southern Tanzania to the Cape. Its habitat is rocky slopes and dry weedy scrub, mainly in mountains in the north of its range. It previously utilized stony arid areas with some short grass, but much of this has been lost to ploughing.

796 Cape White-eye (Kaapse Glasogie)

Scientific name: Zosterops virens

The Cape white-eye (Zosterops virens) is a small passerine bird in the white-eye family. It is native to southern Africa.

There are two subspecies. The western nominate group is now treated as separate species; the Orange River white-eye (Z. pallidus) and the Cape white-eye (Z. virens). The latter can be further divided into two subgroups, the south-western capensis subgroup and the eastern virens subgroup (the so-called green white-eye). All subspecies interbreed where they come into contact (including members of the nominate group with members of the capensis group of both subgroups in Free State).

This species is about 12 cm long with rounded wings, strong legs, and a conspicuous ring of white feathers round the eyes. The upperparts are green, and the throat and vent are bright yellow. The members of the nominate group have a pale yellow central belly with peach coloured flanks. The members of the capensis subgroup have a grey breast and belly, while the virens subgroup have a greenish-yellow breast and belly.

They are very vocal, and constantly keep in touch with soft trilled pee, pree or pirreee callnotes. The song consists of repeated long jerky phrases of sweet reedy notes, varying in pitch, volume and temp, usually starting off with teee teee or pirrup pirrup notes, then becoming a fast rambled jumble of notes, which may incorporate mimicked phrases of other birdcalls.

This is a sociable species forming large flocks outside the breeding season. It builds a cup nest in a tree and lays 2-3 unspotted pale blue eggs. The eggs hatch in 11–12 days, and fledging occurs in another 12–13 days. The peak breeding season is September to December.

The Cape white-eye feeds mainly on insects, but also soft fleshy flowers, nectar, fruit and small grains. It readily comes to bird feeders

814 Southern Masked Weaver (Swartkeelgeelvink)

Scientific name: Ploceus velatus

The southern masked weaver or African masked weaver (Ploceus velatus) is a resident breeding bird species common throughout southern Africa.

This weaver is very widespread and found in a wide range of habitats, including shrubland, savanna, grassland, open woodland, inland wetlands and semi-desert areas. It also occurs in suburban gardens and parks.
The southern masked weaver is 11-14.5 cm long with a short, strong, conical bill and pinkish brown legs. The adult male in breeding plumage has a black face, throat and beak, red eye, bright yellow head and underparts, and a plain yellowish-green back,

The female has a pinkish-brown bill, brown or red-brown eye and is dull greenish-yellow, streaked darker on the upper back. The throat is yellowish, fading to off-white on the belly. The non-breeding male resembles the female but retains the red eye. The juvenile of this species is like the female.

The call is a harsh swizzling, similar to other weavers. It also utters a sharp chuk alarm note.
The southern masked weaver is usually seen singly or in small groups. It may also form larger flocks, alone or with other seed eating species. It eats insects, seeds and nectar, and will come to feeding tables.

Cape Sparrow (Gewone Mossie)

Scientific name: Passer melanurus

The Cape sparrow or mossie (Passer melanurus) is a bird of the sparrow family Passeridae found in southern Africa. A medium-sized sparrow at 14–16 centimetres (5.5–6.3 in), it has distinctive plumage including large pale head stripes. Both sexes are mostly coloured grey, brown, and chestnut, and the male has some black and white markings on its head and neck. It inhabits semi-arid savannah, cultivated areas, and towns, and ranges from the central coast of Angola to eastern South Africa and Swaziland. Three subspecies are distinguished.

Cape sparrows are primarily granivorous, and also eat soft plant parts and insects. The birds typically breed in colonies and gather in large, often nomadic flocks while not breeding. The nest can be constructed in a variety of locations, in a tree or a bush in a hole or an empty nest of another species. A typical clutch contains three or four eggs, and both parents are involved in breeding from nest building to feeding young. The Cape sparrow is common in most of its range and coexists successfully in urban habitats with two of its relatives, the introduced house sparrow and native southern grey-headed sparrow. The population has not been recorded decreasing significantly, so according to the IUCN Red List the species is not threatened.