Lapwings

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 We have a field next door that often floods and has boggy areas. This week we have seen large flocks (50 plus) of lapwing and similar numbers of common gull. I think the fact that the farmer has been muck spreading that field has made it even more attractive for them.


The lapwing (sometimes called Peewit as the call sounds like this) is a fabulous bird. They are getting scarcer at a national level as they prefer untidy habitats and their habitat is disappearing but there appears to be plenty of them still in this area. At a distance they have a distinctive very flight and appear black and white. In close up you can see the distinctive crests and the "black" areas have a wonderful iridescence with greens purples and yellows being evident. 

It's fortunate that there are still areas that these birds find attractive. In the words of the poet Gerald Manly Hopkins.

"Where would the World be once bereft

of wet and of wildness let them be left

Let them be left, wildness and wet

Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet"

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