Guardian Nature School Team Contact Blog Project Noah Facebook Project Noah Twitter

A worldwide community photographing and learning about wildlife

Join Project Noah!
nature school apple icon

Project Noah Nature School visit nature school

Masked Lapwing

Vanellus miles miles

Description:

Large, ground-dwelling bird. Mainly white below, with brown wings and back and a black crown. Large yellow wattles cover the face. Equipped with a thorny spur that projects from the wrist on each wing. The spur is yellow with a black tip. The Masked Lapwing has two subspecies resident in Australia. Northern birds are smaller, without the partial black collar, but have a much larger wattle, which covers most of the side of the face. Southern subspecies has black on the hind neck and sides of breast, and has smaller facial wattles. The sexes are similar in both subspecies, although the male tends to have a larger spur.

Habitat:

Varied but typically open, short-grassed sites, both natural and modified, often beside water of swamps, lagoons and salt marshes.

Notes:

My first reference for identification: The Michael Morcombe eGuide to Australian Birds, Mobile App. Second reference: http://birdlife.org.au/bird-profile/mask...

Species ID Suggestions



Sign in to suggest organism ID

2 Comments

armadeus.4
armadeus.4 9 years ago

They do hey :)

The MnMs
The MnMs 9 years ago

I like lapwings. They have a very distinctive facial feature :-)

armadeus.4
Spotted by
armadeus.4

Western Australia, Australia

Spotted on Jul 25, 2014
Submitted on Jul 25, 2014

Related Spottings

Northern Lapwing Lapwing Northern Lapwing Northern Lapwing

Nearby Spottings

Black Kite/Fork-tailed Kite Bar-shouldered Dove Pied Butcherbird (female with nest) Purple Swamphen
Noah Guardians
Noah Sponsors
join Project Noah Team

Join the Project Noah Team