Northern Lapwing

Identification

A plover with a rounded, pigeon-like silhouette, broad wings and a slow, floppy flight that looks almost bat-like. In breeding plumage the upperparts are dark and metallic, glossed with green, purple and bronze; the underparts are white with a glossy black breast, and the head carries a wispy, upturned crest. The tail has a broad black band tipped with white. In winter the throat, face and breast are washed with white and the gloss dulls, but the crest and the broad rounded wings still give it away.

The display flight is one of the great early-spring sights: the male tumbles and twists over his territory, wings clapping, with a wheezy, drawn-out 'pee-wit' that gave the bird its old English name. On the ground it feeds by a 'run and pause' method, watching bare soil for beetles, worms and leatherjackets rather than probing blindly. Lapwings nest in loose colonies in damp meadows and arable fields, quick to exploit freshly tilled ground, and will mob crows and foxes that come too close to the nest.

Spring is the time to look for them, over farmland, coastal grazing marsh and upland pasture, especially after rain. Outside the breeding season huge flocks settle on estuaries and wet fields, roosting together in open places with long sightlines. Look toward the sun at dusk and you may catch their flashing white underwings as the flocks move to roost.