Masked weavers: more architecture and successful nests

Image source: Pixabay

This is what the busy bird that builds these nests looks like. The males are bright yellow but the females are brown and look like sparrows. They are also members of the Finch family and are about the same size as a house sparrow. The male never actually lives in the nest that he builds, the female uses them for the purpose of raising her young and then they are abandoned and new ones will be built in the next breeding season. Nest building is an instinctive behaviour, it isn't learned from the parent.

A successful territory maintained by a single male. He may have three different females using his nests and he defends the area from other birds. The nests are suspended from very thin branches, to make them inaccessible to predators like rats, large birds or snakes and he has stripped the leaves from the branches so that intruders can be easily seen. This only safeguards the birds in some ways, they are preyed on by larger birds such as crows and cuckoos are known to lay their eggs in their nests as well.

Here's a closeup of the weaving, showing the little grass knots:

The inside roof of the nest is thickly lined with grass, making it reasonably waterproof

Male birds are known to reuse the same territory that they have claimed over the course of their lifetime although it is unclear whether the female harem that he maintains in his territory remains constant.