Banded Lapwings, Murray-Sunset National Park

Banded Lapwings in Murray-Sunset National Park, NW Victoria

Last year we went on a four week holiday through New South Wales and Victoria. I’ve written about that holiday on a number of previous occasions.

When we left Mildura in north west Victoria we didn’t follow the main highway home. Instead, we drove through parts of the extensive Murray-Sunset National Park. This park is mainly mallee scrub, with some open saltbush plains in places. As we were driving along the dirt track I managed to add a number of species to my trip list. One of these was the elusive Banded Lapwing, shown in the photo above.

Banded Lapwings have been something of a bogey bird for me, and I’ve only recorded it on a handful of occasions. Mind you, this is not really all that surprising, for while it is widespread in southern Australia, it is not common anywhere in its range. It is absent in the far tropical north of the continent.

Murray-Sunset National Park, NW Victoria

Banded Lapwing’s preferred habitat is open, stony or ploughed ground or ground with short grass. The photo above shows the vegetation where I saw the Lapwings and this would be typical of its usual habitat. It is often encountered in small groups; only once have I seen a group of about fifty birds. It usually breeds in the months of June through to October, or after rain, and lays 3 – 4  eggs in a scrape on the ground sometimes with a little grass lining.

It is somewhat smaller than its more common and more aggressive cousin, the Masked Lapwing.

Reference:

• Pizzey, G and Knight F: The Field Guide to the Birds of Australia

Murray-Sunset National Park, NW Victoria