Red-billed quelea Red-billed quelea The red-billed quelea (; "Quelea quelea"), also known as the red-billed weaver or red-billed dioch, is a small—approximately long and weighing —migratory, sparrow-like bird of the weaver family, Ploceidae, native to Sub-Saharan Africa. It was named by Linnaeus in 1758, who considered it a bunting, but Ludwig Reichenbach assigned it in 1850 to the new genus "Quelea". Three subspecies are recognised, with "Quelea quelea quelea" occurring roughly from Senegal to Chad, "Q. q. aethiopica" from Sudan to Somalia and Tanzania, and "Q. q. lathamii" from Gabon to Mozambique and South Africa. Non-breeding birds have light underparts, striped brown
Red-headed quelea science for the first time by Gustav Hartlaub in 1848, who named it "Ploceus erythrops". In 1951, Hans von Boetticher regarded the cardinal quelea and red-headed quelea sufficiently different from the red-billed quelea to create a new genus "Queleopsis". The species epithet "erythrops" derives from the Greek word ἐρυθρός (eruthros), meaning "red" and ὄψ (ops) meaning "eye" or "face", referring to the rufous or red face. Ludwig Reichenbach gave the species its first English name in 1863: red-headed dioch. Other vernacular names in the English language include pokerhead, and red-headed weaver. Its vernacular name in Swahili is "kwelea kichwa-chekundu". Based