Lapwings Restored

A fledged lapwing chick from 2020 - by Richard Lockett

Guest blog by Richard Lockett

‘Build it and they will come’.  That’s what Kevin Costner said in the film Field of Dreams. In Kevin’s case he was talking about a baseball pitch, but I thought the principle might still apply to other things. In my case it was lapwings.

My building efforts started 11 years ago. I had never seen a lapwing on the field in question. In fact, the only decent record of lapwings breeding on the farm came from my Mum’s Diary of a Farming Year which she wrote in 1987. There is a short entry for 22nd June: ‘Long walk to the Moor late last night to find lapwing chicks!’.

Despite the lack of recent lapwing activity on the farm, there were some occasional sightings nearby. The ‘Lapwing Field’ consisted of 25 acres of improved, ryegrass pasture that was difficult to drain and occasionally cut for silage. Nothing wrong with that per se, but it didn’t fit the bill for lapwings; in breeding habitat terms it would have been the equivalent of a blue tit trying to nest on a telegraph pole.   

I set to work. Stage one involved some blocking of drains that my father put in the early 1970s. Some tense conversations preceded this. The next step was to put in a couple of wader scrapes; many more have followed since. The final major piece of the jigsaw was the removal of a spruce block that ran along one side of the field. A successful agri-environment scheme application laid the platform for funding the work, but my growing obsession meant we went much further than the scheme required. In truth, I don’t think we would have lapwings now if I had just stuck to the minimum requirements of the scheme.

The result was remarkable and surprising. The birds quickly found the site and bred for the first time in 2010. Seeing newly hatched chicks feeding around the fringes of a newly dug muddy scrape was a special moment. Success breeds enthusiasm and other work followed. In 2015 I bought some Luing heifers which now form the basis of my small herd of Luing cattle. These are an essential part of the management jigsaw and the needs of the site suits these animals well. Lots of quite heavy late summer, autumn and early winter grazing leaves the sward nice and short, a bit poached in places, ideal for lapwing arriving in March.

There have been plenty challenges and setbacks: We’ve had blank years where a combination of weather, predation and bad luck have meant no chicks have fledged. I’ve even found an adult bird impaled on a stock fence; presumably a display flight crash. 

2020 has been a particularly successful breeding season. Lockdown meant I had more time to keep track of the birds properly. By my reckoning, we had four pairs that each successfully raised at least one fledged chick, and at least one pair fledged two. Why this year? A combination of factors: the habitat was spot on, the weather was kind (rain when we needed it but not torrential), I trialled creating some ploughed lapwing plots which they really liked. There may have been factors too: does the fact that 2020 seems to have been a very good vole year reduce predation risk?  

Getting waders back is a huge challenge and requires a fair bit of dedication and some luck, preferably underpinned by good financial incentives and advice. Even then, success isn’t guaranteed. But sometimes, build it and they will come.

Richard Lockett is a freelance farm conservation adviser. He also runs a small farming operation at Knockbain Farm near Dingwall.