The Village Indigo bird is common across Africa. A regular at Footsteps and a favourite among photographers because it’s not shy. It will happily come and feed at your feet so is very easy to photograph and video.
The video below shows perfectly the way this little bird looks for its food by scratching the surface and finding small grass seeds.
Bird information.
Where can we see a Village Indigo bird?
It is found at Footsteps and all over The Gambia
What does it look like?
The Village Indigo bird measures around 12 cm and weighs around 15 grams.
A breeding male has glossy black plumage with orange legs and feet. Its bill is pale and its eyes are dark brown.
What does it feed on?
They feed primarily on grass seeds on the ground by scratching the surface. In villages, they will also feed on cereal used for animal feed, and they also quite like winged termites.
Want to know an interesting Factoid?
It is a brood parasite which means that it lays its eggs in the nest of other birds. In this instance mainly the Red-Billed Firefinch.
How does it sound?
The song is given from a high perch and consists of rapid sputtering and churring intermingled with mimicry of the red-billed firefinch’s song, especially the characteristic chick-pea-pea-pea. Source Wikipedia