What to Know About African Swamphen in Uganda?

The African Swamphen in Uganda is one of the African birds of Uganda seen during birding in Uganda. African swamphen is mainly a sedentary species of swamphen occurring in Uganda.

It used to be considered a subspecies of the purple swamphen, which it resembles, but with bronze green or green-blue back and scapulars.

The African swamphen has a preference for freshwater or brackish ponds, slow flowing rivers, especially those flanked by reeds and sedges, marshes, swamps, it also occurs on seasonally flooded wetlands.

It has length from 38-50cm, wingspan 90-100cm, and weight 725-870g.

How Does the African Swamphen in Uganda Look Like?

The Purple Swamphen has silky purple-blue plumage with metallic gloss on throat and breast, contrasting with the white under tail coverts.

The very large bill is triangle-shaped, with bulky and curved upper mandible, giving the bird a strange appearance.

The bill extends to the head top in a bright red shield, as bill and long legs. The slender toes show fine claws, and especially the rear toe.

Eyes are red too. Both sexes are similar. We can find 13 subspecies which differ in size and colors, although all races have in common the dominant purple-blue tonality.

Gloss is variable, more or less pale or dark. The upperparts range from purple-blue to dark brown, through bronze-green and pale chestnut.

How Does the African Swamphen in Uganda Sing and Make Calls?

The Purple Swamphen’s voice is something difficult to define. When the bird takes off, the call is very similar to the sound produced by a small trumpet.

There are several other rich and varied sounds. The call is given from a hidden place in the dense vegetation, and often at night.

Another call is a kind of wailing, a series of powerful continuous sounds which grow louder and louder, and reach an impressive human sonority.

This call is uttered at the end of the day and in the darkness by only one individual.     Other calls are shorter and raucous, from growl to bell’s sound, ending in a last blow of trumpet.

Many calls are uttered in chorus by several swamphens and always by night, increasing in intensity while the excitation goes up.

How Does the African Swamphen in Uganda Feed?

The Purple Swamphen feeds in a strange way, using its long toes. It feeds while walking if it is protected, along the muddy area close to the reeds.

The food is taken with one leg, mainly the right leg. The food items are held between the toes and raised until half of height separating them from the bill.

If a piece of food falls down, it is recovered with the toes instead of the bill, but the attempt often fails.

The pieces of roots impossible to move in this way are maintained on the ground with the toes and torn to pieces with the bill.

The Purple Swamphen was seen feeding its young with reed sap, tearing off the stems with the bill and taking them with the toes, as a parrot!

How Does the African Swamphen in Uganda Nest?

The Purple Swamphen starts to build the nest when the vegetation is still short. This is a floating nest placed concealed in dense reeds, a platform made with dry stems at base, covered with large leaves and surmounted by a tunnel made with aquatic leaves.

The nest is built by both parents in shallow water, but sometimes in deeper water.  This is a huge structure.

In fact, it is amount of dead reeds on the bottom, and only emerging of some centimeters. Each nest has one or two access-ramps.

How Does the African Swamphen in Uganda Breed?

Social structure and mating system are fairly complex, especially in Uganda, they have monogamous pair-bonds.

All are permanently territorial. Except for the races which are monogamous, most of the other subspecies live in groups with breeding males and females, and helpers. The females lay in communal nest.

How Does the African Swamphen in Uganda Reproduce?

The laying occurs in April-May. Female lays the eggs in a roughly done cup. They are fairly large and glossy, with pale shell which may vary in tinge and spotted purplish and brown.

Incubation lasts about 25 days. The chicks leave the nest 4-5 days after hatching. They are covered in black down, legs are red with long toes and claws are black.

The bill is yet stout, dark grey with bright red at base. The first feathers which appear very soon, are yet purple-blue, typical of immature birds.

They grow up quickly, fed by both parents. In young, the red of the bill starts by the shield, and reaches the whole bill in August.