Red-billed quelea each nest. This species may nest several times per year when conditions are favourable. In the breeding season, males are diversely coloured. These differences in plumage do not signal condition, probably serving instead for the recognition of individual birds. However, the intensity of the red on the bills is regarded an indicator of the animal's quality and social dominance. Red-billed quelea males mate with one female only within one breeding cycle. There are usually three eggs in each clutch (though the full range is one to five) of approximately long and in diameter. The eggs are light bluish or greenish
Red-billed quelea "aethiopica". Linnaeus himself did not explain the name "quelea". "Quelea quelea" is locally called "kwelea domo-jekundu" in Swahili, "enzunge" in Kwangali, "chimokoto" in Shona, "inyonyane" in Siswati, "thaha" in Sesotho and "ndzheyana" in the Tsonga language. M.W. Jeffreys suggested that the term came from medieval Latin "qualea", meaning "quail", linking the prodigious numbers of queleas to the hordes of quail that fed the Israelites during the Exodus from Egypt. The subspecies "lathamii" is probably named in honor of the ornithologist John Latham. The name of the subspecies "aethiopica" refers to Ethiopia, and its type was collected in the neighbouring Sennar