Quail-plover

About the Quail-plover

The quail-plover, lark buttonquail or lark-plover (Ortyxelos meiffrenii) is a small ground-living bird in the buttonquail family Turnicidae that is found in the Sahel region of Africa and in a disjunct region of East Africa. It is the only species placed in the genus Ortyxelos.

The quail-plover is a small, short-tailed cursorial bird which slightly resembles a miniature courser when on the ground. The upperparts are a sandy-rufous colour and the underparts mainly whitish. They show a distinctive wing pattern in flight when the contrast between the white primary coverts and the black with white-tipped remiges to form a distinct diagonal band on the upperwing. Its fluttering flight style is rather lark-like. The females are slightly darker than the males while the juveniles are paler.

The quail-plover occurs in Sahel from southern Mauritania and northern Senegal eastwards to northern Cameroon and southern Chad into South Sudan and southern Sudan with separate populations in northern Benin and coastal Ghana, with another in Uganda, Kenya and Ethiopia.

The quail-plover is usually found singly or in pairs in dry grassland... Wikipedia →