Profile
In flight
Songbirds
African Paradise Flycatcher
Terpsiphone viridis
- uncommon
- 36 km/h
- Least Concern
The male grows tail streamers twice his body length in breeding season. Your message arrives dramatically, or not at all.
- Population
- Not quantified globally; described as uncommon to abundant across its range, with a stable population trend (IUCN 2024 assessment)
- Habitat
- Dry savanna (major habitat), riparian and gallery woodland, subtropical/tropical moist lowland and montane forest edges, thickets, plantations, rural gardens and arable/agricultural land, from sea level up to about 2,840 m
- Fun fact
- Breeding males grow dramatically elongated central tail streamers — commonly more than twice their body length — that stream behind them in flight and are used in courtship display.
- Range
- Sub-Saharan Africa, from Senegal across to the Horn of Africa and south to South Africa, with some populations extending to the southwestern Arabian Peninsula (Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Oman); occurs across roughly 48 countries/territories; many populations are intra-African migrants (Extent of Occurrence ~26.8 million km² resident/breeding, ~25 million km² non-breeding)
- Diet
- Insectivorous — hawks flying insects (flies, moths, beetles) from a perch and gleans caterpillars, other invertebrate larvae/eggs, and spiders from foliage; occasionally takes berries
- Size
- 0.17 m
- Wingspan
- 0.24 m
- Lifespan
- 9 years
