Red-billed quelea in colour, sometimes with some dark spots. Some clutches contain six eggs, but large clutches may be the result of other females dumping an egg in a stranger's nest. Both sexes share the incubation of the eggs during the day, but the female alone does so during the cool night, and feeds during the day when air temperatures are high enough to sustain the development of the embryo. The breeding cycle of the red-billed quelea is one of the shortest known in any bird. Incubation takes nine or ten days. After the chicks hatch, they are fed for some days
Red-billed quelea during daylight hours. The governments of Botswana, Ethiopia, Kenya, South Africa, Sudan, Tanzania, and Zimbabwe have regularly made attempts to lessen quelea populations. The most common method to kill members of problematic flocks was by spraying the organophosphate avicide fenthion from the air on breeding colonies and roosts. In Botswana and Zimbabwe, spraying was also executed from ground vehicles and manually. Kenya and South Africa regularly used fire-bombs. Attempts during the 1950s and '60s to eradicate populations, at least regionally, failed. Consequently, management is at present directed at removing those congregations that are likely to attack vulnerable fields. Red-billed quelea