The village weaver (Ploceus cucullatus), also known as the spotted-backed weaver or black-headed weaver (the latter leading to easy confusion with P. melanocephalus), is a species of bird in the family Ploceidae found in much of sub-Saharan Africa. It has also been introduced to Portugal and Venezuela as well as to the islands of Hispaniola, Martinique, Puerto Rico, Mauritius and Réunion.[1]
This often abundant species occurs in a wide range of open or semiopen habitats, including woodlands and human habitation, and frequently forms large noisy colonies in towns, villages, and hotel grounds. This weaver builds a large coarsely woven nest made of grass and leaf strips with a downward-facing entrance, which is suspended from a branch in a tree. Two or three eggs are laid. Village weavers are colonial breeders, so many nests may hang from one tree.
Village weavers feed principally on seeds and grain, and can be a crop pest, but readily take insects, especially when feeding young, which partially redresses the damage to agriculture. The calls of this bird include harsh buzzes and chattering.
Philipp Ludwig Statius Müller provided the first scientific name, Oriolus cucullatus, in his 1776 translation in German of the famous Systema Naturae, written by Carl Linnaeus. The classification provided by Statius Muller was based on a description by Buffon, who in turn made use of work by Mathurin Jacques Brisson. Brisson was the first to publish a black-and-white etching of the bird in 1760. The first colored figure was made by François-Nicolas Martinet in a book titled Planches enluminées d'histoire naturelle by Edme-Louis Daubenton, that was published in 1783. The specimen described by Brisson was collected in Senegal by Michel Adanson between 1748 and 1754, and who sent it to René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur in France.[3] Latham eventually gave the scientific name Oriolus textor in 1790. Based on Oriolus textor, Johann Friedrich Gmelin erected in 1825 a new genus he named Textor.[4] This name has priority over the use of the genus name in the combination Textor alecto that Temminck described in 1828, and which is a synonym for the first name of the white-billed buffalo-weaver, Coccothraustes albirostris, as named by Vieillot in 1817, and now assigned to the genus Bubalornis.[5] The species epithet cucullatus is Latin and means "hooded".[3]
In 1789, Johann Friedrich Gmelin distinguished Loxia abyssinica, which was later recognised as a subspecies of the village weaver and for which the new combination P. c. abyssinicus was created.[6] Louis Pierre Vieillot described a slightly different bird that he called subspecies collaris in 1819. Nicholas Aylward Vigors in 1831 distinguished subspecies spilonotus.[7]
The first English name, "weever oriole" was given by John Latham, an early British ornithologist, whose work was often cited by Linnaeus.[3] "Village weaver" has been designated the official name by the International Ornithological Committee.[8] Other English names are "black-headed weaver", "Layard's black-headed weaver", "black-hooded weaver", "mottled-backed weaver", "mottled weaver", "spotted-backed weaver", "spot-backed weaver", and "V-marked weaver".