Plovers and lapwings | Charadriidae

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Compact birds with a large head, a short neck and a short bill thickened towards the tip — made for picking prey off the surface, not for probing into it. They feed with a characteristic pattern of run, stop and peck, also after dark, and many species tremble one foot on wet soil to bring prey to the surface. Black bands across breast and head break up the outline against bare ground, and the heavier lapwings often carry yellow wattles at the base of the bill and a sharp spur or knob on the bend of the wing, with which they strike at intruders near the nest. The clutch is almost always four pear-shaped eggs, points inwards in a scrape on bare gravel, saltpan crust or closely grazed grassland; when danger comes the parents lure the intruder away with a feigned broken wing. Wing shape varies within the family: long and pointed in the species that shuttle between Siberia and the African coast, broad and rounded in the resident birds of the interior, which gives them a slow, flapping flight.