Sociable Weaver

Philetairus socius

A tiny bird famous for building enormous apartment-complex nests. Great social-network metaphor and very Roost-coded.

Population: Number of mature individuals not precisely quantified; described by BirdLife/IUCN as common to abundant, with a population suspected stable in the absence of evidence of decline, across a ~1,080,000 km² range
Habitat: Arid savanna and thornveld of the southern Kalahari, favoring open grassland with scattered large trees (often Acacia/Vachellia) or artificial structures like telephone poles for nesting; dependent on stiff grasses (e.g. Stipagrostis ciliata) as nest material
Fun fact: Sociable Weavers build the largest communal nest structures of any bird — thatched, haystack-like mega-nests that can house 100+ breeding pairs and remain in continuous use for decades (some over a century).
Range: Southern Africa: Extent of Occurrence ~1,080,000 km² across Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa (centered on Northern Cape Province), permanent resident, non-migratory
Diet: Primarily insectivorous — insects (notably harvester termites) make up roughly 80% of the diet — supplemented with seeds and other plant matter, foraged mostly on the ground but also from bark/leaves; obtains water almost entirely from food rather than drinking
Size: 0.14 m
Wingspan: 0.25 m
Lifespan: 10 years

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