February 2017 : Caspian Plover, White-tailed Lapwing and Nile Valley Sunbird, (almost) new for Chad

My apologies for the long delay since my previous WABDaB blog of September.  Since then more than 3,000 records and more than 300, often very nice, photos have been added, mostly from Chad and thanks to Tim Wacher and Paul van Giersbergen.  These include Caspian Plover (new species for Chad), White-tailed Lapwing (second record for Chad), Brown-tailed Rock Chat (we are still sorting out some issues on this record) and Nile Valley Sunbird.  All four are new WABDaB species and the latter would be a new species for West Africa as a whole. 

We have been looking into reports of Nile Valley Sunbird and Pygmy Sunbird from northern Chad for almost a year now but Paul van Giersbergen's photo from the Ennedi in September 2016 clearly shows a male with a (not very wide) purple breastband similar to Nile Valley Sunbird.  Interbreeding of the two species in northern Chad is a possibility.  We will keep you posted of what we find out.

For Niger some 200 records were added, thanks to Enrico Leonardi, Sharmila Pillai and Tim and Barbie Kusserow.  The most remarkable record is of House Sparrows from the Diffa area, where the species is reported to be common now, also in Displaced Persons camps.

Redigé: 2017-02-10 [JBr]