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Egyptian Plover | Pluvianus aegyptius
Krokodilwachter | Pluvial
The Egyptian Plover is a small, strikingly patterned plover-like bird of sandbanks in large tropical rivers, black, blue-grey and cream with a black cap and a black breast band. Within the region it occurs only in the far north of Angola and is one of the most sought-after species in the region.
Voice
A high, sharp chee-chee-chee or kree-kree-kree, often in flight, and soft contact twittering while feeding.
Recording: Andrew Spencer — CC BY-NC-SA 4.0 · converted to mono · xeno-canto
Identification
19–21 cm. The cap, eye stripe, mantle and a narrow breast band are glossy black; a broad white supercilium runs from the bill into the nape. The wing coverts and tail are blue-grey, the throat and underparts creamy white with a salmon to orange-buff belly. In flight the wing shows a striking pattern: a broad white band across the black flight feathers with a black trailing edge. The short bill is black and the legs blue-grey. The sexes are alike; juveniles are duller, with rusty feather edges.
Confusion species
No real confusion within its range in the region. Common Ringed Plover Charadrius hiaticula and Kittlitz's Plover Anarhynchus pecuarius are brown above and lack the blue-grey wing and black mantle. Pratincoles such as Rock Pratincole Glareola nuchalis of the same rivers are slimmer, long-winged and dark-coloured.
Habitat
Broad, sandy rivers with open sandbanks and islets that are exposed at low water. It forages walking and running for insects, larvae and small molluscs along the waterline. The nest is a scrape in the sand; in heat or danger the parents bury eggs and chicks in the sand and cool them with water carried in their belly feathers. The story that the bird picks crocodiles' teeth clean has never been confirmed.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of southern Africa.
Range and movements
Within the region only in the north and north-east of Angola, along large rivers of the Congo Basin such as the Cuango and the rivers of Lunda, where it is local and scarce. Beyond the region from Senegal and Gambia through West and Central Africa to South Sudan and Ethiopia, south to Gabon, Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is absent south of Angola.
How and when to look
Plan a trip in the dry season (June to October) along the large rivers of northern Angola, when sandbanks are exposed and the birds breed. Scan the sand with a telescope: the black-and-white head pattern and blue-grey back stand out, and a flushed bird gives itself away with the bold wing pattern.
Conservation status
Not threatened and locally common over most of its range. Poorly known in Angola and dependent on undisturbed sandbanks; dams, sand extraction and disturbance by people and livestock on the banks are the main threats.
Scientific name
Pluvianus aegyptius | (Linnaeus, 1758)
Linnaeus described the species in 1758 as Charadrius aegyptius; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Pluvianus was introduced in 1816 by Vieillot. Pluvianus is formed from the French pluvier, 'plover' — because the Egyptian Plover was believed to be closely related to the true plovers. aegyptius is Latin for 'Egyptian', after the country where the species was described in the eighteenth century and where it no longer breeds. The specimen the first description was based on came from Egypt.