List of Birds of South Sudan

South Sudan has had several years of civil war that has affected traveling to the country and over 800 species recorded in South Sudan, there would be plenty to attract the keen bird watcher were it not for major concerns over security, safety, and ease of access. One can only hope that the situation improves sufficiently to allow greater travel in this country in the future. There have been few visits by bird watchers in recent years but those that have been to the country have found a number of new species and range extensions.

The Nile which flows north to south through the country is an important migration highway. The Sudd is one of the world’s largest swamplands and the country has a range of habitat types. Five major biomes are represented each of which includes range-restricted species: Sudan Guinea-Savannah; Somali-Masai; Sahel; Guinea-Congo Forests and Afrotropical Highlands.

• Abdim’s stork
• Abyssinian
• Abyssinian crimson-wing
• Abyssinian ground hornbill
• Abyssinian ground thrush
• Abyssinian nightjar
• Abyssinian scimitar-bill
• Abyssinian thrush
• Abyssinian white-eye
• Afep pigeon
• African black duck
• African black-headed oriole
• African blue fly catcher
• African citril
• African collared dove
• African crake
• African crested flycatcher
• African cuckoo
• African cuckoo hawk
• African darter
• African emerald cuckoo
• African finfoot
• African fish eagle
• African golden oriole
• African goshawk
• African grass-owl
• African gray flycatcher
• African gray hornbill
• African gray woodpecker
• African green pigeon
• African harrier hawk
• African hawk-eagle
• African hill babbler
• African hobby
• African jacana
• African marsh-harrier
• African mourning dove
• African openbill
• African palm-swift
• African piculate
• African pied hornbill
• African pied wagtail
• African pipit
• African pygmy goose
• African pygmy kingfisher
• African rail
• African reed warbler
• African scops owl
• African shrike-flycatcher
• African silverbill
• African skimmer
• African snipe
• African spoonbill
• African spotted creeper
• African stonechat
• African swamphen
• African thrush
• African wood-owl
• African yellow warbler
• African yellow white-eye
• Allen’s gallinule
• Alpine swift
• Amethyst sunbird
• Arabian bustard
• Ashy cisticola
• Ashy flycatcher
• Augur buzzard
• Ayres’s eagle
• Black bishop
• Baglafecht weaver
• Baka indigobird
• Bamboo scrub warbler
• Banded martin
• Banded snake-eagle
• Bank swallow
• Bar-breasted firefinch
• Barn owl
• Barn swallow
• Barred warbler
• Basra reed warbler
• Bat hawk
• Bateleur
• Bearded vulture
• Bearded woodpecker
• Beaudouin’s snake-eagle
• Beautiful sunbird
• Black collared apalis
• Black coucal
• Black crake
• Black cuckoo
• Black cuckoo-shrike
• Black dwarf hornbill
• Black goshawk
• Black heron
• Black kite
• Black sawwing
• Black scimitar-bill
• Black scrub robin
• Black stork
• Black-and-white casqued hornbill
• Black-and-white mannikin
• Black-and-white shrike-flycatcher
• Black-bellied bustard
• Black-bellied firefinch
• Black-bellied plover
• Black-bellied seed-cracker
• Black-billed barbet
• Black-billed dove
• Black-billed turaco
• Black-billed weaver
• Black-billed wood hoopoe
• Black-breasted barbet
• Black-casqued hornbill
• Black-cheeked waxbill
• Black-chested snake-eagle
• Black-crowned crane
• Black-crowned night heron
• Black-crowned sparrow-lark
• Black-crowned tchagra
• Black-crowned waxbill
• Black-eared wheatear
• Black-faced quail-finch
• Black-faced rufous warbler
• Black-faced waxbill
• Black-headed bee-eater
• Black-headed gonolek
• Black-headed gull
• Black-headed heron
• Black-headed lapwing
• Black-headed weaver
• Black-necked cisticola
• Black-necked weaver
• Black-rumped waxbill
• Black-tailed godwit
• Black-throated apalis
• Black-throated barbet
• Black-winged bishop
• Black-winged kite
• Black-winged lapwing
• Black-winged oriole
• Black-winged pratincole
• Black-winged stilt
• Blue malkoha
• Blue quail
• Blue-bellied roller
• Blue-breasted bee-eater
• Blue-breasted kingfisher
• Blue-capped cordon-bleu
• Blue-cheeked bee-eater
• Blue-headed coucal
• Blue-napped mouse-bird
• Blue-shouldered robin-chat
• Blue-spotted wood-dove
• Bluethroat
• Blue-throated brown sunbird
• Booted eagle
• Boran cisticola
• Broad-billed roller
• Broad-billed sandpiper
• Bronze mannikin
• Bronze-tailed starling
• Bronze-winged courser
• Brown babbler
• Brown illadopsis
• Brown parisoma
• Brown snake-eagle
• Brown twin-spot
• Brown woodland warbler
• Brown-backed woodpecker
• Brown-capped weaver
• Brown-chested alethe
• Brown-chested lapwing
• Brown-crowned tchagra
• Brown-eared woodpecker
• Brown-necked raven
• Brown-rumped bunting
• Brown-tailed rock-chat
• Brown-throated wattle-eye
• Brubru
• Bruce’s green pigeon
• Buff-bellied warbler
• Buff-crested bustard
• Buff-spotted flufftail
• Buff-spotted woodpecker
• Buff-throated apalis
• Bush petronia
• Cabanis’s bunting
• Cabanis’s greenbul
• Cameroon indigobird
• Cape crow
• Cape robin
• Cape teal
• Cardinal quelea
• Cardinal woodpecker
• Caspian plover
• Caspian tern
• Cassin’s flycatcher
• Cassin’s honeyguide
• Cattle egret
• Chestnut sparrow
• Chestnut wattle-eye
• Chestnut weaver
• Chestnut-backed sparrow-lark
• Chestnut-crowned sparrow-weaver
• Chestnut-headed sparrow-lark
• Chin-spot batis
• Chocolate-backed kingfisher
• Cinnamon bracken warbler
• Cinnamon weaver
• Cinnamon-breasted bunting
• Cinnamon-chested bee-eater
• Clapperton’s francolin
• Collared pratincole
• Collared sunbird
• Common bulbul
• Common buzzard
• Common chiffchaff
• Common crane
• Common cuckoo
• Common greenshank
• Common house martin
• Common kestrel
• Common nightingale
• Common ostrich
• Common pochard
• Common quail
• Common redshank
• Common redstart
• Common ringed plover
• Common sandpiper
• Common snipe
• Common swift
• Common waxbill
• Common whitethroat
• Compact weaver
• Congo serpent eagle
• Congo-bay owl
• Copper sunbird
• Corn crake
• Cream-colored courser
• Crested francolin
• Crested guineafowl
• Crested lark
• Cricket warbler
• Crimson-rumped waxbill
• Croaking cisticola
• Crowned eagle
• Crowned hornbill
• Crowned lapwing
• Curlew sandpiper
• Cut-throat finch
• Cyprus wheatear
• D’amaud’s barbet
• Dark-chanting goshawk
• Demoiselle crane
• Denham’s bustard
• Desert cisticola
• Desert wheatear
• Dideric cuckoo
• Donaldson-smith nightjar
• Double-toothed barbet
• Dunlin
• Dusky babbler
• Dusky tit
• Dusky turtle dove
• Dusky-blue flycatcher
• Dwarf bittern
• Dwarf kingfisher
• Eastern bonelli’s warbler
• Eastern bronze-napped pigeon
• Eastern chanting goshawk
• Eastern olivaceous warbler
• Eastern orphean warbler
• Eastern plantain eater
• Eastern violet-backed sunbird
• Eastern yellow-billed hornbill
• Egyptian goose
• Egyptian nightjar
• Egyptian plover
• Egyptian vulture
• Emerald-spotted wood dove
• Emin’s shrike
• Equatorial akalat
• Ethiopian boubou
• Ethiopian swallow
• Eurasian blackcap
• Eurasian curlew
• Eurasian golden oriole
• Eurasian griffon
• Eurasian hobby
• Eurasian hoopoe
• Eurasian marsh-harrier
• Eurasian nightjar
• Eurasian reed warbler
• Eurasian river warbler
• Eurasian scops owl
• Eurasian sparrow-hawk
• Eurasian spoonbill
• Eurasian stone-curlew
• Eurasian turtle dove

• Eurasian wigeon
• Eurasian wryneck
• European bee-eater
• European honey buzzard
• European pied flycatcher
• European roller
• Exclamatory paradise whydah
• Familiar chat
• Fan-tailed grassbird
• Fan-tailed raven
• Fan-tailed widowbird
• Fawn-breasted waxbill
• Ferruginous duck
• Fine-spotted woodpecker
• Fire-crested alethe
• Flappet lark
• Forbe’s plover
• Forest robin
• Forest weaver
• Fox kestrel
• Foxy cisticola
• Freckled nightjar
• Fulvous whistling duck
• Gabar goshawk
• Gadwall
• Gambaga flycatcher
• Garden warbler
• Garganey
• Giant kingfisher
• Glossy ibis
• Glossy-backed drongo
• Golden nightjar
• Golden pipit
• Golden-backed weaver
• Golden-breasted bunting
• Golden-tailed woodpecker
• Goliath heron
• Gosling’s apalis
• Graceful prinia
• Grasshopper buzzard
• Gray apalis
• Gray cuckoo-shrike
• Gray heron
• Gray kestrel
• Gray wagtail
• Gray’s malimbe
• Gray-backed fiscal
• Gray-capped warbler
• Gray-crowned crane
• Gray-headed batis
• Gray-headed bush-shrike
• Gray-headed gull
• Gray-headed kingfisher
• Gray-headed nigrita
• Gray-headed olive-back
• Gray-headed social weaver
• Grayish eagle-owl
• Gray-rumped swallow
• Gray-throated barbet
• Gray-tit flycatcher
• Gray-winged robin-chat
• Gray-wren warbler
• Great bittern
• Great blue turaco
• Great cormorant
• Great crested grebe
• Great egret
• Great gray shrike
• Great reed warbler
• Great snipe
• Great spotted cuckoo
• Great white pelican
• Greater blue-eared starling
• Greater flamingo
• Greater honeyguide
• Greater kestrel
• Greater painted snipe
• Greater short-toed lark
• Greater spotted eagle
• Greater swamp warbler
• Green crombec
• Green hylia
• Green sandpiper
• Green sunbird
• Green wood hoopoe
• Green-backed camaroptera
• Green-backed eremomela
• Green-backed twin-spot
• Green-backed woodpecker
• Green-bee-eater
• Green-headed sunbird
• Green-throated sunbird
• Green-winged teal
• Grosbeak weaver
• Gull-billed tern
• Hadada ibis
• Hairy-breasted barbet
• Half-collared kingfisher
• Hamerkop
• Harlequin quail
• Hartlaub’s bustard
• Hartlaub’s duck
• Helmeted guineafowl
• Hemprich’s hornbill
• Heuglin’s francolin
• Heuglin’s masked weaver
• Heuglin’s wheatear
• Honeyguide greenbul
• Hooded vulture
• Horus swift
• Hottentot teal
• Hunter’s sunbird
• Icterine warbler
• Imperial eagle
• Intermediate egret
• Isabelline shrike
• Isabelline wheatear
• Jabandu indigobird
• Jack snipe
• Jackson’s hornbill
• Jameson’s wattle-eye
• Joyful greenbul
• Karamoja apalis
• Kentish plover
• Kitilitz’s plover
• Klaas’s cuckoo
• Knob-billed duck
• Kordofan lark
• Kordofan sparrow
• Kori bustard
• Lanner falcon
• Lappet-faced vulture
• Latham’s francolin
• Laughing dove
• Leaf-love
• Least honeyguide
• Lemon dove
• Lesser black-backed gull
• Lesser blue-eared starling
• Lesser bristlebill
• Lesser flamingo
• Lesser gray shrike
• Lesser honeyguide
• Lesser jacana
• Lesser kestrel
• Lesser moorhen
• Lesser sand plover
• Lesser striped swallow
• Lesser swamp warbler
• Lesser whitethroat
• Lesser-masked weaver
• Lesser-spotted eagle
• Levaillant’s cuckoo
• Levant sparrow-hawk
• Little bee-eater
• Little bittern
• Little crake
• Little egret
• Little grebe
• Little green sunbird
• Little greenbul
• Little ringed plover
• Little rock thrush
• Little rush warbler
• Little sparrow-hawk
• Little stint
• Little swift
• Little weaver
• Lizard buzzard
• Long-billed pipit
• Long-crested eagle
• Long-legged buzzard
• Long-tailed cormorant
• Long-tailed glossy starling
• Long-tailed hawk
• Long-tailed nightjar
• Long-tailed paradise whydah
• Long-toed lapwing
• Lowland sooty boubou
• Luehder’s bush-shrike
• Madagascar bee-eater
• Magpie mannikin
• Magpie starling
• Malachite kingfisher
• Malachite sunbird
• Mallard
• Marabou stork
• Mariqua sunbird
• Marsh owl
• Marsh sandpiper
• Marsh tcagra
• Marsh warbler
• Martial eagle
• Masked shrike
• Meyer’s parrot
• Mocking cliff-chat
• Montagu’s harrier
• Montane white-eye
• Mosque swallow
• Mottled spinetail
• Mottled swift
• Mountain buzzard
• Mountain yellow warbler
• Mouse-colored penduline-tit
• Moustached grass warbler
• Namaqua dove
• Narina trogon
• Neumann’s starling
• Niam-Niam parrot
• Nile valley sunbird
• Northern black flycatcher
• Northern brownbul
• Northern carmine bee-eater
• Northern crombec
• Northern double-collard sunbird
• Northern fiscal
• Northern gray-headed sparrow
• Northern masked weaver
• Northern pintail
• Northern puffback
• Northern red bishop
• Northern red-billed hornbill
• Northern shoveler
• Northern wheatear
• Northern white-crowned shrike
• Northern white-faced owl
• Nubian woodpecker
• Nyanza swift
• Olive sunbird
• Olive tree warbler
• Olive-bellied sunbird
• Olive-green camaroptera
• Orange river francolin
• Orange-winged pytilia
• Oriole finch
• Osprey
• Ovambo sparrow-hawk
• Pale flycatcher
• Pale prinia
• Palestine sunbird
• Pale-winged indigobird
• Pallid harrier
• Pallid honeyguide
• Pallid swift
• Palm-nut vulture
• Parasitic weaver
• Parrot-billed sparrow
• Pearl-spotted owlet
• Pel’s fishing owl
• Pennant-winged nightjar
• Peregrine falcon
• Piapiac
• Pied avocet
• Pied crow
• Pied kingfisher
• Pied wheatear
• Pink-backed pelican
• Pink-breasted lark
• Pink-footed puffback
• Pin-tailed whydah
• Piping hornbill
• Plain greenbul
• Plain martin
• Plain nightjar
• Plain-backed pipit
• Purple grenadier
• Purple heron
• Purple starling
• Purple-throated cuckoo-shrike
• Puvel’s illadopsis
• Pygmy batis
• Pygmy falcon
• Pygmy sunbird
• Quail finch
• Quail plover
• Quail-finch indigobird
• Rameron pigeon
• Rattling cisticola
• Red-and-yellow barbet
• Red-backed scrub-robin
• Red-backed shrike
• Red-bellied malimbe
• Red-billed buffalo weaver
• Red-billed duck
• Red-billed dwarf hornbill
• Red-billed firefinch
• Red-billed ox-pecker
• Red-billed pytilia
• Red-billed quelea
• Red-capped robin-chat
• Red-cheeked cordon-bleu
• Red-chested cuckoo
• Red-chested flufftail
• Red-chested sunbird
• Red-collard widowbird
• Red-eyed dove
• Red-eyed puffback
• Red-faced cisticola
• Red-faced crombec
• Red-footed falcon

• Red-fronted barbet
• Red-fronted prinia
• Red-fronted tinkerbird
• Red-headed blue-bill
• Red-headed lovebird
• Red-headed malimbe
• Red-headed quelea
• Red-headed weaver
• Red-necked buzzard
• Red-necked falcon
• Red-pate cisticola
• Red-rumped swallow
• Red-shouldered cuckoo-shrike
• Red-tailed bristlebill
• Red-tailed greenbul
• Red-throated bee-eater
• Red-throated pipit
• Red-winged gray warbler
• Red-winged lark
• Red-winged prinia
• Red-winged pytilia
• Red-winged starling
• Reichard’s seedeater
• Reichenow’s seedeater
• Ring-necked dove
• Ring-necked francolin
• Rock martin
• Rock pigeon
• Rock pratincole
• Rock-loving cisticola
• Rose-ringed parakeet
• Ross’s turaco
• Rosy-patched bush-shrike
• Ruddy turnstone
• Ruff
• Rufous chatterer
• Rufous flycatcher thrush
• Rufous-breasted sparrow-hawk
• Rufous-chested swallow
• Rufous-crowned eremomela
• Rufous-crowned roller
• Rufous-napped lark
• Rufous-necked wryneck
• Rufous-rumped lark
• Rufous-sided broadbill
• Rufous-tailed rock thrush
• Rufous-tailed scrub robin
• Ruppell’s griffon
• Ruppell’s robin-chat
• Ruppell’s starling
• Ruppell’s warbler
• Ruppell’s weaver
• Sacred ibis
• Saddle-billed stork
• Sahel paradise whydah
• Saker falcon
• Sanderling
• Savi’s warbler
• Scaly francolin
• Scaly-breasted illadopsis
• Scaly-throated honeyguide
• Scarlet-chested sunbird
• Schlegel’s francolin
• Scissor-tailed kite
• Secretary bird
• Sedge warbler
• Semi-collared flycatcher
• Senegal coucal
• Senegal lapwing
• Senegal thick-knee
• Sennar penduline tit
• Sharpe’s drongo
• Sharpe’s starling
• Shelley’s sparrow
• Shelley’s starling
• Shikra
• Shinning sunbird
• Shinning-blue kingfisher
• Shoebill stork
• Short-toed snake-eagle
• Side-colored boubou
• Siffling cisticola
• Silverbird
• Silvery-cheeked hornbill
• Simple greenbul
• Singing bush-lark
• Singing cisticola
• Slender-billed greenbul
• Slender-billed weaver
• Slender-tailed nightjar
• Small buttonquail
• Snowy-crowned robin-chat
• Sociable lapwing
• Somali bunting
• Somali crow
• Sooty chat
• Sooty flycatcher
• Southern citril
• Southern pochard
• Speckle-breasted woodpecker
• Speckled mouse-bird
• Speckled pigeon
• Speckle-fronted weaver
• Spectacled weaver
• Splendid starling
• Splendid sunbird
• Spot-flanked barbet
• Spotted crake
• Spotted flycatcher
• Spotted ground thrush
• Spotted honeyguide
• Spotted morning thrush
• Spotted redshank
• Spotted thick-knee
• Spur-winged goose
• Spur-winged lapwing
• Squacco heron
• Standard-winged nightjar
• Star-spotted nightjar
• Steel blue whydah
• Steppe eagle
• Stone partridge
• Stout cisticola
• Straw-tailed whydah
• Streaky seedeater
• Striated heron
• Striolated bunting
• Striped flufftail
• Striped kingfisher
• Stuhlmann’s starling
• Sudan golden sparrow
• Sulphur-breasted bush-shrike
• Sun lark
• Superb starling
• Superb sunbird
• Swainson’s sparrow
• Swallow-tailed bee-eater
• Swamp flycatcher
• Swamp nightjar
• Tacazze sunbird
• Taita falcon
• Taita fiscal
• Tambourine dove
• Tawny eagle
• Tawny pipit
• Tawny-flanked prinia
• Temmnick’s courser
• Temmnick’s stint
• Terek sandpiper
• Thick-billed cuckoo
• Three-banded courser
• Three-banded plover
• Three-streaked tchagra
• Thrush babbler
• Thrush nightingale
• Tiny cisticola
• Toro-olive greenbul
• Tree pipit
• Tsavo sunbird
• Tufted duck
• Variable sunbird
• Velvet-mantled drongo
• Verreaux’s eagle
• Verreaux’s eagle-owl
• Vieillot’s barbet
• Vieillot’s weaver
• Village indigobird
• Village weaver
• Vinaceous dove
• Violet-backed starling
• Viteline masked weaver
• Wahlberg’s eagle
• Waller’s starling
• Wattled lapwing
• West African seedeater
• Western black-headed batis
• Western black-headed oriole
• Western bronze-napped pigeon
• Western nicator
• Western orphean warbler
• Western violet-backed sunbird
• Western yellow wagtail
• Whimbrel
• Whinchat
• Whiskered tern
• Whistling cisticola
• White crested turaco
• White helmet-shrike
• White stork
• White wagtail
• White-backed duck
• White-backed night-heron
• White-backed vulture
• White-bellied bustard
• White-bellied canary
• White-bellied go-away bird
• White-bellied tit
• White-billed buffalo weaver
• White-breasted cuckoo-shrike
• White-browed coucal
• White-browed robin-chat
• White-browed sparrow weaver
• White-cheeked turaco
• White-chinned prinia
• White-collard starling
• White-crowned robin-chat
• White-eyed slaty-flycatcher
• White-faced whistling duck
• White-fronted black chat
• White-fronted plover
• White-headed barbet
• White-headed buffalo weaver
• White-headed lapwing
• White-headed sawwing
• White-headed vulture
• White-headed wood hoopoe
• White-napped pigeon
• White-rumped babbler
• White-rumped seedeater
• White-rumped swift
• White-shouldered black-tit
• White-spotted flufftail
• White-starred robin
• White-tailed ant-thrush
• White-tailed lapwing
• White-tailed lark
• White-throated bee-eater
• White-throated greenbul
• White-winged tern
• White-winged widowbird
• Willcock’s honeyguide
• Willow warbler
• Winding cisticola
• Wing-snapping cisticola
• Wire-tailed swallow
• Wood sandpiper
• Wood warbler
• Woodchat shrike
• Woodland kingfisher
• Woolly-necked stork
• Yellow bishop
• Yellow longbill
• Yellow penduline tit
• Yellow-bellied eremomela
• Yellow-bellied hyliota
• Yellow-bellied waxbill
• Yellow-billed barbet
• Yellow-billed duck
• Yellow-billed ox-pecker
• Yellow-billed shrike
• Yellow-billed stork
• Yellow-breasted apalis
• Yellow-browed camaroptera
• Yellow-crested woodpecker
• Yellow-crowned bishop
• Yellow-crowned canary
• Yellow-fronted canary
• Yellow-fronted tinkerbird
• Yellow-mantled weaver
• Yellow-necked francolin
• Yellow-rumped tinkerbird
• Yellow-shouldered widowbird
• Yellow-spotted petronia
• Yellow-throated cuckoo
• Yellow-throated greenbul
• Yellow-throated longclaw
• Yellow-whiskered greenbul
• Zebra waxbill
• Zitting cisticola

Best time for birding in South Sudan

The rainy season starts in mid-April to May and both maximum and minimum temperatures drop in this period. However, because of the increased humidity, it can even feel hotter. South Sudan has a very dry winter with almost no rain. So birding in south Sudan can be done all year round.

South Sudan is covered in tropical forests, swamps, and grassland. The White Nile passes through the country. The most rainfall in South Sudan is between the months of April and October and the average yearly total for rainfall is approximately 953 mm.