The most numerous bird is the red-billed weaver. Black-headed weaver African weavers have the largest nests
A tiny weaver bird creates huge nests on telegraph poles in the Kalahari Desert. Photographer Dillon Marsh's Assimilation project shows how birds blend artificial poles into a landscape with real trees.
1. A telephone pole near Upington in South Africa is covered with twig and weaver bird nests. Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
2. Dillon, from Cape Town, explains: “The sociable weaver bird has made the vastly barren landscapes of the southern Kalahari its own, perching on the telephone poles that line its habitat.” Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
3. “Their growing nests are not immediately static, but are full of life. The twigs and grass collected to build the nest are combined to create recognizable identities instead of inanimate pillars.” Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
4. “I looked at these nests as a child during the holidays with my family, and their impressive size mesmerized me. I began to develop an interest in relationships between people and environment, and these nests seemed like the perfect thing for me.” Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
5. “I spent three days exploring the area around Upington in South Africa, which is part of the Kalahari Desert. I used a 4x5 camera to take the photos, and due to the high cost of film, I only took one photo of each nest. It was my first time using a camera like this, so I was very happy to see the results of my labors.” Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
6. Sociable weaver birds build permanent nests in trees and other tall objects. These nests are the largest built by any bird, and are large enough to accommodate more than a hundred pairs of birds living in multiple generations at a time. Nests consist of separate chambers, each of which is occupied by a pair (sometimes with offspring). Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
7. Nests are built around large and sturdy structures, such as acacia trees and telegraph poles. Nests built in electricity poles sometimes cause short circuits during the rainy season, and may catch fire during the dry season. Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
8. Nests are highly structured and provide birds with more favorable conditions compared to the outside temperature. The central chambers retain heat and are used for overnight stays. External rooms are used for daytime shade and maintain a temperature of 7-8 degrees Celsius, while the outside air temperature can fluctuate up to 16-33 degrees Celsius. Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
9. Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
10. Picture: Dillon Marsh / Rex Features
Features and habitat of the weaver bird
The weaver bird is a talented architect and builder of nesting colonies. Weaver bird- a relative and in terms of body structure, as well as a thick and short beak, proportions of the tail and wings, it is extremely similar to its relatives. And the sounds she makes resemble abrupt chirping.
The weaver family is numerous and is divided into 272 species. The body length of these representatives of the passerine order varies from 8 to 30 cm. The color of the plumage depends on the variety, and can be extremely diverse.
How can you be sure photo of weaver, many species of these are not at all bright, and the color of their feathers can be modest brown, gray or black.
But there are also varieties that nature has generously endowed with original exotic colors. These include fire weaver, striking others with the brightness of its impressive red plumage.
In the photo there is a fire weaver
In many species of these winged creatures, male cavaliers look especially elegant, decorated with colors of a wide variety of shades, including rich black, yellow and red tones. In other varieties, females do not differ at all in plumage color from their gentlemen.
Mainly from the family weavers African varieties are more common than others. They live on this warm continent all year round and nest there in huge, noisy colonies.
But individual species these can be found in Europe, in neighboring Asia and on the island of Madagascar. These birds inhabit semi-deserts and savannas, the outskirts of wooded areas and open forests, but in dense forests usually not found.
Character and lifestyle of the weaver bird
In terms of external features, weavers have many similarities with finches. However, the lifestyle of these birds is very unique. They need trees because weavers build nests it is on them, and they can get their food exclusively in open spaces.
Typically, weaver birds live in large flocks, the number of which, as a rule, is at least several dozen individuals, and often the number of birds in a group amounts to several thousand or even millions of birds.
They are especially famous for their large number red-billed weavers, which form entire huge nesting colonies. Moreover, after hatching the chicks, the number of individuals increases many times over, making such aggregations an impressive bird colony, numbering in the tens of millions of individuals, which is practically a record for birds around the world.
Pictured is a red-billed weaver
These are inhabited mainly by shrouds. And when such a multitude of inhabitants soar into the air, it is an indescribable and impressive sight.
A grandiose flock of birds obscures even the light of the sun. And the air in the area from the flying flock is filled with the mysterious, deafening and ominous hum of many voices.
The weaver bird flies quickly, writing sharp pirouettes in the air, and often flaps its wings. But in addition, these birds are renowned and talented builders. And it was precisely for the persistent and tireless weaving of nests that they got their name.
The elaborate structures of these birds come in a wide variety, sometimes resembling round wicker baskets that are attached to tree stems.
They can also take on bizarre forms in the form of a drop hanging from the crown of a tree, with a peculiar branch, acquiring the outline of a mitten, as well as other interesting and impressive architectural formations.
Moreover appearance weaver nest, as a rule, depends on the variety of this bird, and each species shows construction talents in its own way.
Birds sometimes build their nests so close to each other that sometimes they even merge into single architectural ensembles. Nesting colonies of common social weavers can serve as striking examples of the creators of such grandiose structures.
Their construction works they lead on the branches of aloe and acacia. Their grandiose structures can exist and be used by birds for years. And only from time to time these zealous owners of buildings repair them, complete construction and update them.
Weavers build entire ensembles of nests
Architectural masterpieces can in some cases be so bulky that, especially in damp weather after rain, the entire structure, when wet, becomes so heavy that trees collapse under its weight, and the grandiose architectural work of many generations of these talented birds perishes irretrievably, unable to be renewed .
But the talents of weavers do not end there, because some species of birds have a pleasant voice, and lovers enjoy their melodic singing.
Many varieties of such winged creatures, for example, finch weavers, bred and maintained by humans. They are domesticated and cultivated in Japan; these birds are also popular in Russia.
Weaver bird feeding
The thick and short beak of weavers eloquently indicates that they are granivores. And this, in fact, is the only way to feed these animals, and their food can only be the seeds of wild grasses and various grain crops, which they find in abundance in man-cultivated fields, which are their favorite way of obtaining food.
Such natural habits of birds very often become big problem, since numerous flocks of birds are capable of causing untold harm to the grain harvest, destroying thousands and thousands of tons of grain every year.
The time for active searching and obtaining food for birds, especially in hot weather, is usually the first half of the day and the pre-sunset period.
Heading towards the food source weaver flies out into the fields with the first ray of sun and searches for food until noon, and in the evening returns again to places full of desired food.
Reproduction and lifespan of the weaver bird
Usually weaver bird actively reproduces and produces offspring during the wet period of the year. But even at this time, these birds continue to live in flocks, without retiring in separate pairs and without dividing the territory of common residence into personal nesting areas, while actively continuing the construction of their architectural ensembles.
In the photo the bird is a velvet long-tailed weaver
Females choose their temporary life partners largely based on their ability to weave nests, because the main stages of building a home for future chicks depend on the male.
Male individuals of these birds make the base of the structure - a “hammock”, choosing long and thin grasses, tying loops on them and fastening them together, and then completing common features the buildings.
The females just make the nest cozy, decorate it, cover it with something soft and lay eggs in it. While the father of the family - agile weaver He’s already doing his best to help their neighbor, his new girlfriend, build a cozy nest.
A clutch of weavers usually contains up to six eggs, which can have a wide variety of colors: gray, pink, blue, fawn. The hatched chicks grow and develop very quickly.
The photo shows a weaver bird's nest
It takes less than ten months for them to develop into mature birds and master all the skills for the work of adding to the size of the bird colony. During the dry season, there is usually a break in the breeding of these birds.
Weavers are desirable prey for many predatory species of animals and, why great amount These birds die every year, so the life expectancy of birds in natural conditions is usually no more than 5 years. Domesticated individuals can sometimes live twice as long.
Weavers
Among the numerous passerine birds in nature, there is a family of weavers, uniting up to three hundred species of the most diverse in shape, size and plumage of original small birds. Their sizes are very small - together with the tail, 8-12 cm (amaranth weaver finches, golden-breasted, blue astrilds, Sinegalese weaver finches and others), 20-25 cm (buffalo weaver finches and others).
Different types of weavers sing in their own way. But their main “wealth” is their amazingly colorful plumage, combining the entire gamut of different color shades. And, perhaps, none of the small birds can compete with them.
Weavers have settled all over the globe. They are even found in Antarctica (these are field and house sparrows). But the most numerous and diverse representatives of the weaver family are in the subtropics and in the countries of Africa, Australia, Asia and South America.
The Soviet Union is home to 11 species of weavers belonging to four genera: snow finches (one species), ground sparrows (two species), rock sparrows (two species), sparrows (six species).
These birds received their name for the amazing art of building nests from palm leaves and flexible blades of grass, moistening them with saliva. They very cleverly separate fibers along the entire length of the sheet. The shapes of the nests can be ovoid, spherical, bottle-shaped, etc. They are distinguished by their extraordinary strength. 60
Weavers nest in large colonies on thin branches of various trees along river banks. For the purpose of self-defense from attacks by their enemies, sometimes there are up to hundreds of nests on one tree.
Most weavers are granivores. But among them there are birds with a massive beak, belonging to the group of various finches, and thin-beaked ones, belonging to the group of astrilds. The latter, along with grain food, willingly include insects in their diet and hunt for them especially zealously during the breeding season: it is with these that weaver birds feed their chicks.
The food for all types of weavers are grains of various cereals; they prefer reed seeds to everything else.
Weavers first appeared in the Soviet Union relatively recently. Back in the early 60s of this century, weaver birds were extremely rare among bird lovers. Their importation from abroad by the All-Union Animal Association began only in last years, and now lovers of exotic birds in our country have the opportunity to purchase weaver birds in pet stores. However, some fanciers complain that the bird quickly dies in captivity.
Experience and observations have shown that a significant percentage of weavers die due to improper feeding and maintenance.
Keeping weavers in cage-like conditions is not difficult. Considering that many of them are very small in size, it is recommended to make special cages for weavers with a distance between the rods of no more than 1 cm. Joint maintenance various types weavers are undesirable, as the big ones offend the little ones. The cages must be kept perfectly clean, otherwise the birds may get sick and even die.
Over many years of being interested in birds, I managed to collect a large collection of exotic and ornamental songbirds, including more than 30 varieties of weaver birds. It's hard to say which of them is better or worse. Each type is good in its own way. Amaranth weaver finches, astrilds, finches and others, at a certain period of time, with their fabulously colorful plumage are able to conquer even the most indifferent people to nature.
Most weaver birds are close to finches, but far from them in the quality of their singing. Only males sing. Each species of weaver has its own song, which is their characteristic feature. The singing of a fire weaver, for example, is even unpleasant, it resembles the friction of pieces of iron. The amaranth weaver finches, steelhead weavers, tiger and blue astrilds, widow's finch, and also dandelions sing much more pleasantly.
All weavers coming from abroad feed on certain feeds in their homeland, but in our country the types of feeds change dramatically, which leads to significant death of birds.
In July-August 1971, the All-Union Zoological Association brought a large batch of various animals to the Soviet Union, and among them there were a significant number of weavers. Some of the birds were sent to pet stores in the Central Asian republics for sale. Observations have shown that a sharp transition from feeding in natural conditions to feeding when kept in cage-aviary conditions led to a large percentage of the death of imported birds.
In order to preserve incoming batches of weaver birds, the All-Union Zoological Association and their branches in various republics of the Soviet Union, when selling birds through the country's pet stores, are obliged to provide bird lovers with printed instructions and special food for them.
Feeding
Observations of weaver birds over many years have shown that the following types of food can be recommended to fanciers. From the very beginning, newly brought birds must be given kunk (Italian bristleweed) and canary seed from the grain mixture, using separate feeders. In addition to these feeds, a regular grain mixture should be given.
From soft foods, you can give fresh cottage cheese, hard-boiled and finely chopped chicken eggs, baked white and gray bread (in crumbs), as well as various porridges hard-boiled with the addition of a small amount of salt and sugar to taste (semolina, millet, buckwheat).
Any vegetables, fruits and herbs are suitable for green vegetable and fruit food, depending on the season and time of year. Dill, parsley, watermelons, melons, carrots, and cabbage are especially useful for weavers. Vegetables and herbs must be finely chopped. It is better to cook carrots, beets and other vegetables using a grater.
It is possible that in the first days the birds will not be willing to eat soft and green food. Therefore, you need to be patient and change the food daily so that it is always fresh. Over time, any bird gets used to new conditions and food.
Forage wild-growing cereals are very useful and are well accepted from the very beginning by all types of weavers, but they especially readily eat Panicum krugzali and festuka.
All weavers, and especially slender-billed weavers (astrilds), must also be given animal food: various insect larvae, caterpillars, boiled meat (very finely chopped), as well as mealworms. Animal food is necessary during the period of feeding the chicks.
It is recommended to feed weavers glazed millet. Take one glass of millet, egg and granulated sugar. Chicken yolk with sugar (4-5 spoons) is beaten like eggnog and then poured over the millet. The mixture is mixed and spread in a thin layer on thick paper to dry. Birds are given this glazed millet 2-3 times a week.
When mating, laying eggs and feeding chicks, it is advisable to add “nightingale” food to the main food - a mixture of dry ant eggs with grated carrots and crushed white breadcrumbs. This is how she prepares. Dry ant eggs are scalded with boiling water, then boiling water should be added in small portions until the swollen eggs stop absorbing water. Place them in a colander or sieve, rinse with cold water and squeeze lightly. Add a little crushed white crackers to the grated carrots, stirring them thoroughly until they become crumbly. homogeneous mass. All this is mixed with boiled ant eggs. The weight ratio is 5:4 (grated carrots in relation to dry unboiled eggs are always taken one part more).
It is very useful to feed weavers with mealworms, which can be bred in a box with a tight-fitting lid. A hole measuring 15X10 cm is cut out in the lid and covered with a fine mesh. Cotton cloth is placed at the bottom of the box and a layer of bran up to 2 cm thick is poured. Then again a layer of cloth and bran. It is in such an “apartment” that mealworms are placed. You need to make sure there is enough moisture in the box. To do this, you can add boiled and raw potatoes and carrots. But it’s best to take an ordinary lamp wick, make a slot on the front wall of the box (the width of the wick), lower one end of the wick 10-15 cm inside the box, and leave the other outside. The outer part of the wick should be 2-3 cm long.
Every day, the outer end of the wick should be moistened with water until it is completely wet. With this method of maintaining humidity, the contents of the box are completely protected from mold and rot. The box should be in a dark place, the temperature in it should not exceed + 20-25°. It is recommended to put three or four days old bread into the box in large pieces, always with a crust. Inside this bread, mealworms go through their reproductive cycle.
Weavers, like canaries, are very clean and love to swim. Therefore, special bathing suits made of glass or plastic with water are hung in the cages.
It is advisable to change drinking water twice a day, especially in summer time. And change minerals (egg shells, charcoal, school chalk, river sand) at least once every 10-15 days.
Breeding
The plumage of weavers before the mating season resembles that of sparrows. It is difficult to distinguish males from females during this period.
With the onset of the mating season, the color of the males gradually begins to change and from a simple gray bird they turn into beautiful birds. Thus, the male fire weaver “dresses” in black and fiery red colors; The Napoleon weaver becomes an olive-yellow-black color, the Sinegalese steel weaver becomes black with a bluish-greenish tint. Amaranth weaver finches are varied in color: brownish-red alternating with various shades of other colors. Tiger astrilds turn raspberry-brown-red with many white dots.
We managed to achieve offspring from silver-billed, red-throated, zebra, Japanese and Indian finches, dandies, and blue astrilds.
Moscow poultry farmer R. G. Vasilevsky keeps weaver birds in pairs and successfully obtains offspring from them. Tashkent resident M. Zakharov also achieved great success in breeding weaver species using the same method of keeping birds. One detail is characteristic: M. Zakharov receives offspring from golden-breasted astrilds only in winter. Apparently, our winter corresponds in time to spring in tropical countries, and perhaps the humidity of the surrounding air also plays a big role.
During the mating period, dry soft grass, rice straw, and building material for constructing a nest are placed in the cage or enclosure. For nests, you can use cans, wooden boxes or cardboard boxes, as well as nest boxes such as small birdhouses.
As soon as the bird begins to intensively build a nest in the cage, down and small feathers from chickens, ducks, and geese are added to “complete the construction.”
Females lay two to five eggs. The chicks hatch on 12-14 days. Male and female zebra finches take turns incubating the eggs. Moreover, at night only females sit, and males “stand guard.”
If Japanese and Indian finches live in a cage, then at night they are all placed together in the nest. This variety of weavers is the most friendly, which is why it differs from its counterparts.
Dressmaker birds live in India, Ceylon, Indochina and Java: 7 species and all sew nests from leaves. They bend one or several leaves growing nearby with a bag, pierce their edges with a beak and sew the leaves together, threading cobwebs or fibers from plant fluff into the holes. Inside the green cradle, the bird builds a soft nest of cotton, down and wool.
Dressmaker birds live near populated areas, in gardens, and on plantations. They also settle on the verandas of residential buildings and “sew” their nests from the leaves of indoor plants.
In some countries along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in Africa, South Asia and Northern Australia, other tailor birds live - from the genus Cisticola. In rice and corn fields of Spain and Greece, cisticolas are not uncommon. The male makes the nest. Just like the Indian seamstress bird, he sews together two sheets of web thread and weaves a soft nest.
There are 68 species in the subfamily of true weaver birds. Almost all are in sub-Saharan Africa, with only 5 in South Asia, 2 in Madagascar and 1 in southern Arabia. Many of them look like sparrows, which, by the way, are also from the weaver family, but are brightly and variegatedly colored. Perhaps no bird has mastered the art of nest weaving with such skill as weavers. It is “weaving”, one might say, even “knitting” with a certain pattern. This is not a simple heap or weave of building material in disorder, but a real woven work from plant fibers. Loops and puffs alternate and intertwine in a certain order. The nest itself is tied to branches or stems of tall grasses with real knots. The bird passes fibers pulled from plants through its fingers several times, so that a loop is formed, and then takes the end of the “rope” with its beak and tightly tightens the knot.
In true weaver birds, the males “weave” the nests. The females only finish the interior of the finished house, lining the spherical “floor” with soft materials, and weaving a “ceiling” under the roof - obviously additional protection from the tropical sun.
Males do not live in monogamy: each one weaves nests for several females and leaves them, leaving them to incubate and raise their offspring in a cozy home.
Weavers living in savannas settle in trees in large colonies, up to hundreds of nests on one baobab or acacia. Each one hangs at the end of a branch, and all together from a distance look like large fruits. In tropical forests, weavers live in families outside of a close community. From the entrance to the nest, long tubes are usually woven outward - a kind of vestibule or canopy. Steppe weavers have short vestibules or none at all: only a round entrance at the bottom, in the “floor” of the nest.
Any construction begins with the procurement of materials. The weaver, having split off a narrow strip from a palm leaf with its beak, holds it in its beak and flies, pulls it along and tears off the workpiece the right size. Some build nests from grass stems. From such fibers, in the fork of thin terminal branches, the frame of the nest is first woven - a dense ring oriented vertically. Then, on one side, this ring is extended with a bag or a dome - a hemisphere is obtained, the back wall of the nest. When it is finished, plant fibers are woven into the ring on the other side - the front hemispherical wall is woven. An inlet hole is left at the bottom.
The house is built - the residents (that is, the female) themselves will take care of its interior decoration and ongoing, if necessary, repairs.
Indian weavers have this approximate rhythm of building and raising children. After five days of hard work, the nest is half ready, and then the female appears. She will carefully examine sometimes more than twenty nests before choosing one of them. Males who have built poor nests have difficulty finding a bride and remain bachelors throughout the summer. Once the female has become comfortable in his home, the male begins to weave a new nest, usually on another branch of the same tree. A mistress will soon be found for him too. Together they finish the nest. She lays eggs, and the male leaves her.
By that time, his first nest was already free of inhabitants. The second time it is not used for its intended purpose, but only as a convenient support for weaving another nest below it (already No. 3). When it is done and the female approves of the work, the male takes on nest No. 4 (usually under nest No. 2). The most diligent and skillful builders have up to five nests over the summer: one under the other - No. 1, No. 3 and No. 5, on another branch - No. 2 and No. 4.
“It has long been known that males bring lumps of clay to nests and smear them into the walls of the nesting chamber for strength... In rainy times, numerous fireflies appear in rice fields, females catch them to feed their chicks. Previously, it was incorrectly believed that birds stuck their heads into the clay on the walls of the nest to illuminate their children’s room at night” (Gerhard Grümmer).
Community weavers from a subfamily close to real weavers, with the help of many families, construct a common apartment house. On the strong branches of a large tree (nowadays often also on telegraph poles) twigs and grass are laid in a heap - a kind of thatched roof grows in breadth and height. Old nests of social weavers, built over many years, can be up to three and even five meters in diameter. Birds, generation after generation, live in them for decades, until, under the weight of their house, the branch collapses to the ground along with the entire structure.
Below, under a common roof, there are separate nesting chambers for each family. There are up to a hundred or more of them. Small falcons, parrots and other birds take up residence in empty apartments, with which the weavers coexist peacefully. They do not have polygamy, like real weavers, but monogamy. Social weavers live in South Africa.
The family of Astrilds, ornate, or blood-red weavers, consists of 125 species. They live in Africa, South Asia and Australia. Birds of amazing colors: local bright red, yellow, blue, black, green and many other indescribable tones are combined in amazingly colorful, elegant and tasteful ways. Not as “vulgar” as, say, parrots. Many of the astrildids, for example African amaranths, are now fashionable among hobbyists as pet birds.
The nests are like those of real weaver birds, but with less complex weaving. In addition to those in which chicks are hatched, nests are also built for joint overnight stays.
Some Australian astrilds drink water not like, say, chickens, sparrows and other passerine birds, raising their heads from the water with each sip, but suck it with their beaks immersed, like pigeons and sandgrouses.
The “mating dance” of Astrilds is very unusual: the male sings, jumping, bending and throwing out other frisky “knees”, sitting... astride the female, or in a similar way dances in front of her. The “dancer” often holds a blade of grass or a feather in its beak as a “nest symbol.”
Astrild chicks have yellow, white, blue tubercles in the corners of their mouths, sometimes bordered by a black ring, and black dots and stripes on the palate, tongue and along the edges of the beak. When such a colorful mouth opens, it is difficult for parents to contain their impatience: feed and feed it! It is clearly visible in the twilight of the nest: multi-colored tubercles, at least in some species of astrilds, reflect the rays and glow in the dark!
The chicks of each species of astrilds have different combinations of colors and basic tones of mouth decorations. The color of bare skin on the body (meaty, brown, black) or thick down also varies; some astrilds are born covered in down. A special-sounding squeak and a different manner of turning their heads, begging for food.
It would seem that it would be easy for the astrilds to distinguish their chicks, endowed with such clear identification marks, from other foundlings, and no cuckoo would deceive them.
The chicks of widow weavers have the same signs and similarities in their mouths, on their bodies, and in their nesting behavior patterns as in young astrilds of the very species whose cares raise their offspring.
They throw eggs into the nests of astrilds. And here, not like cuckoos, there is a wide choice of rearing birds, but a narrow specialization: the chicks of each species of widows are raised by astrilds, also of one particular species.
When mating time approaches, the tail feathers of many widowbird males grow incredibly long and wide. Several times longer than the bird and almost as wide as its body! Because of these bulky feathers, it is difficult for the bird to fly, even impossible against the wind. And yet, two feathers, the shorter ones, fly upward, and the two longest feathers, lowered obliquely downwards, fly, flowing in the air. They also display on branches, spreading their tail feathers in the same way, bowing their heads down and “belching” with their open mouth: a symbolic image of the now unnecessary feeding of chicks.
What kind of talents does nature give to birds? They sing, they talk, they dance. But weavers skillfully weave their homes from knots and strands. 
There are about 100 species of weavers, and they differ greatly from each other. Real weavers are rather modestly colored, but astrilds and finches are as brightly colored as parrots. These small birds belong to the order Passeriformes and are native to Africa. Almost all weavers are found south of the Sahara. Many of them, however, spread to Asia: even now weavers live in India, and in Japan, for example, the zebra finch is cultivated as a domestic bird. 
finch weaver 
Fire weaver 
Malimbus weaver 
Red-breasted Wood Weaver 
Red-billed weaver
Among wild birds The champion in numbers is the representative of the passerine order - the red-billed weaver.
Over 10 billion of these birds live in West Africa! Even the annual destruction of over 200 million weaver birds does not affect their numbers. 
These birds are usually the size of a sparrow or slightly larger. By the way, sparrows, along with weaver birds, are part of this family. Weaver birds have a short, strong beak; they eat seeds and fruits, as well as small animals. 
Males and females are colored differently. During the mating season, males of some weaver species dress up in yellow or red feathers, others in green and black. Females, as a rule, have dull plumage. 
With the first rains at the beginning of the wet season, weavers fly to their nesting sites. At this time, fresh vegetation appears, which can be used in nest construction. For nesting different types weavers choose different places. Most of them prefer free-standing trees in forest clearings, savannas and gardens. Weavers try to build their nest closer to water, as it serves as good protection from predators. But there are species that nest in dense or flooded forests or in reed thickets. It is among forest species that single nesting pairs are found. 
Weavers got their name from their ability to build unusually skillful nests. Some look like balls with a side entrance. Others have an oval shape, and the taphole is attached to the side. Still others are round, and the entrance looks like a long tube leading down. The nests are woven from blades of grass, and the inside is lined with thin plant fibers and feathers. They are suspended on stems of grass or on thin branches of bushes or trees. Thanks to this, eggs and chicks are safe in such nests. Although the nests sway in the wind, they are inaccessible to snakes and other predators. 
The weaver bird starts a new nest. 
Weaver builds on old nest 
The weaver bird always builds its nest in the same sequence. First he makes a roof, which he pays special attention to because it will protect against rain. Then, after a few days, he begins to build a ceiling that does not weave, laying it out from pieces of leaves until all the gaps disappear. After this, in a descending manner, it weaves the walls of the future nest and the “hallway”. At the same time, the weaver weaves a nest above its head, moving backwards until the entrance becomes horizontal. 
The completed nest has an oval shape and a horizontal long axis. The inlet is located at one of its ends and faces down. The male finishes it last, after the female settles into the nest.
Having completed the nest with a regular round or elongated shape (depending on the type of weaver), the male begins to attract the female.
It hangs under the nest with its head to the hole and energetically beats its wings, making specific sounds. If the female is attracted to this behavior, she will enter the nest to inspect. The rejected nest gradually loses its attractiveness, dries out and becomes straw-colored. As a rule, after a week no one needs such a nest, and the male leaves it or destroys it.
If the female likes the nest, she takes possession of it and almost immediately mates outside. Now the male is prohibited from entering the nest until the chicks appear, and he continues to weave the outer part, adding an entrance corridor and shaping its edges. After this, the male no longer tries to strengthen the nest, refresh it or repair it. Gradually, the grass weaving of the nest dries out and acquires an ocher color.
Meanwhile, the female takes care of the interior decoration of the nest and lines its walls with leaves, blades of grass and soft feathers. She lays the first egg 1 or 2 days after mating, and then at intervals of 1 day another 2-3 white, light blue or light green eggs. Their coloring is usually uniform, sometimes with reddish-brown streaks. The width of the eggs (depending on the type) is 13.4-16.9 mm, and the length is 20.5-25.1 mm. The female incubates the eggs alone for 12 days. The chicks are fed by both parents and remain in the nest for 17-21 days. Their parents bring them insects, which are abundant during the rainy season.
Having settled his girlfriend, the male immediately begins to build a second nest in order to lure the next female into it. A male red-billed weaver has an average of two females each breeding season.
When the chicks grow up, all the birds - both young and adults - unite into more or less numerous flocks that go in search of food. 
They are so funny! And their nests are unusual. And the females are picky. They say that if the female does not like the nest, she discards it and the male begins to build it again and so on until everything is OK. Only after this the female begins to lay eggs and breed offspring. 
Apart from a few species, weaverbirds are social birds. They often nest together with their relatives, and on one tree you can see many hanging nests. Some weaver species make communal nests. For example, such colonial nesting sites in tree crowns are built by the common social weaver (Philaeterus socius). They are a huge pile of grass thrown on the branches of some thorny tree in the form of an umbrella. From above this building is flat and smooth, its lower side is drilled with holes leading into nest cavities, the number of which can reach fifty! The size of the colony is impressive if you remember that the builders are small birds! Sometimes trees even break under the weight of such a structure, and the birds have to move to another tree. The nests of the social weaver last for several years and are constantly repaired by their small inhabitants. From a distance, these buildings are very reminiscent of native huts. The red-billed weaver (Quelea quelea) is one of the most abundant birds of the acacia savannas of sub-Saharan Africa. Its breeding colonies number 10,000,000 nests (up to 5,000 per tree), and after the young have fledged, some flocks contain up to 40,000,000 birds! 
Throughout the African savannas, the cuckoo weaver is common - a small yellow-colored bird that lays its eggs in the nests of small passerines. 
Among the Asian species, the most numerous and famous is the Baya weaver, found from Pakistan to Thailand and Sumatra. 
During the mating season, the male weaves several hanging nests, each of which is occupied by females. 
A distinctive feature of the trees in the East African savanna are the unusual structures hanging from the branches. These are the nests of weaver birds. 
The collective nest of the African social weaver gives shelter to tens and even hundreds of birds. The technique of its construction is in many ways similar to the technique of weaving baskets. Each pair of weaver birds incubates their chicks in a separate nesting chamber. 
In Namibia, such “communal apartments” are more common, sometimes reaching gigantic proportions 
Black-headed weavers with nests. East Africa, Rwanda 
