Birds of Somalia: all 709 species on record

In short

On 12 November 2026 the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) held records of 709 bird species with Somalia as the country (GBIF occurrence search, birds, Somalia). GBIF holds 22,984 bird records from Somalia. Of these, 14,536 are sightings by people, 13,570 of them shared through eBird, run by the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Another 8,055 are museum specimens, held mostly by the American Museum of Natural History (2,625), the Senckenberg museum in Frankfurt (1,609) and the Field Museum in Chicago (1,261) (same source).

Birds found only in Somalia

Several birds on this list are endemic to Somalia, meaning they are found nowhere else. Among them are the Somali pigeon, the Somali thrush and the Somali lark (IUCN Red List, Columba oliviae; IUCN Red List, Mirafra somalica). The Somali pigeon, the Somali thrush and the Warsangli linnet are endemic to the mountains of the north, which BirdLife International treats as the North Somali Mountains Endemic Bird Area (Wikipedia, Somali montane xeric woodlands, backup).

Names that carry "Somali"

Many birds of the region carry Somali in their English names, including the Somali crow, Somali fiscal, Somali sparrow, Somali bee-eater, Somali courser, Somali starling, Somali crombec and the Somali ostrich, one of only two ostrich species in the world. The Juba weaver is named after the Juba river (pages linked).

How to read this list

A species is on this list when GBIF holds at least one record of it from Somalia. Migrant birds that pass through or spend the northern winter in Somalia are included. Records range from museum specimens more than a century old to sightings made this year, and a few may be misidentified, so the list is a list of records, not of what is present today.

Red List summary

• Critically Endangered (CR): 6
• Endangered (EN): 10
• Vulnerable (VU): 11
• Near Threatened (NT): 24
• Least Concern (LC): 635
• Data Deficient (DD): 2
• Not Evaluated (NE): 21

Categories are from the IUCN Red List as published through GBIF (GBIF species API, IUCN Red List category).

Largest families

• Accipitridae: 45 species
• Muscicapidae: 36 species
• Alaudidae: 30 species
• Ploceidae: 27 species
• Scolopacidae: 24 species
• Laridae: 22 species
• Cisticolidae: 22 species
• Charadriidae: 17 species
• Columbidae: 17 species
• Motacillidae: 17 species

Full list (709 species)

Each name links to its Calankii page where one exists, otherwise to its GBIF species page. "Records in Somalia" is the number of GBIF occurrence records with Somalia as the country, counted on 12 November 2026 (GBIF occurrence search, Somalia). The same rows, with Wikidata ids and more columns, are in the open data file species-recorded-in-somalia.csv.

This list is in 5 parts: 1 · 2 · 3 · 4 · 5

This list is in 5 parts: 1 · 2 · 3 · 4 · 5

Sources

• GBIF occurrence search, country Somalia
• GBIF Backbone Taxonomy
• IUCN Red List of Threatened Species