LAPWING 237 



tail coverts snow white. Tail consisting of twelve feathers, 

 two other ones white, the rest white with a band of black 

 near the end, widest in the middle ones and narrowing 

 as it approaches the sides of the tail. Primaries black, 

 secondaries pure white, tertiaries and wing coverts ash grey 

 with dark feathers coming out same as back" (E. Williams). 



LAPWING. Vanellus vulgaris (Bechstein). 



Coloured Figures. Gould, * Birds of Great Britain,' vol. iv, pi. 

 33 ; Dresser, ' Birds of Europe,' vol. vii, pi. 531 ; Lilford, 

 ' Coloured Figures,' vol. v, pi. 16. 



The Lapwing, Green Plover, or Peewit 1 , is familiar to 

 to most of us. Large numbers remain to breed in our Isles, 

 while the arrival of autumn and spring migrants makes this 

 species still more abundant. In Ireland and Scotland, 

 where unreclaimed moor-land and marsh are still extensive, 

 the Lapwing is even more plentiful than in England. 



In the latter country, the resident birds are prevented 

 from increasing to any great extent, by the piactice of 

 systematically robbing their eggs for table-use. In Ireland, 

 on the contrary, the eggs are little interfered with, while 

 large numbers of the birds are netted wholesale for the 

 markets : netting, however, is carried on chiefly in autumn 

 and winter, so that many of the victims are migrants from 

 the north. 



Pasturage, ploughed fields, the shores of inland lakes, 

 the banks of the larger rivers, as well as the slob-lands of 

 our tidal estuaries, all afford feeding-ground for this widely- 

 distributed Plover. 



The Lapwing is one of the most handsome and remark- 

 able of our native birds ; it is endowed with an elegant bead- 

 crest of long gently-curved and tapering plumes, and with 

 strongly-contrasted plumage, of unsullied white and satin- 

 black ; this, on the wings and back, exhibits in the reflected 

 light of the sunshine, a beautiful play of iridescence, which 

 varies from deep metallic-green to violet. The bird should, 



1 These three are not merely local names, but are so well known 

 to sportsmen and naturalists that when speaking or writing about this 

 Plover they may be used indiscriminately. 



