In nature conservation, success and failure go hand in hand. A vivid example of this is the lapwing project of the Federal Nature Conservation Agency (BN) in Seefeld in Upper Bavaria. As elsewhere in Bavaria, the meadow breeder species with the distinctive, black crest of feathers on the back of the head was widespread there not so long ago. Seven years ago, however, the local stock almost completely collapsed. The local BN boss Günter Schorn and his volunteers around Seefeld counted just three adult birds. There was great fear that they, too, would soon disappear from the region. That should not happen. Schorn and his volunteers started a small species conservation program and began feeding the tiny remaining population.
“We convinced the farmer in the breeding area to sow later in his fields and also to leave wet patches on them, which the young lapwings need,” reports Schorn. “And we surrounded the nests with 1.20 meter high electric fences. That’s how we kept foxes, martens and other small predators away from the eggs.” Above all, however, the BN people were present in the breeding area on a daily basis and made sure that the birds remained as undisturbed as possible – by free-roaming dogs as well as by walkers or cyclists. “The success was sensational,” says Schorn. “Within four years we had 13 adult birds in Seefeld, in 2019 we counted 20 lapwings there including their offspring.”
The joy was over quickly. The farmer suddenly wanted to farm his fields as before, and the BN had to withdraw from the species welfare project at the beginning of 2020. The consequences for the Seefeld lapwings: Since then, all their broods have been in vain. Not a single chick that has hatched since has fledged. All fell prey to predators. Of course, this also had consequences for the adult birds. “Their number has now shrunk by half,” says Schorn, whose disappointment at the loss of love’s effort can be clearly heard on the phone.
Elsewhere in Bavaria, the lapwing is no less dramatic. “We currently have maybe 6,000 to a maximum of 9,500 breeding pairs in Bavaria,” says Jan Skorupa, 38, and a biologist at the nature conservation organization LBV. “Nationwide, it is expected that stocks have declined by almost 90 percent in the last 25 years.” In the red lists of Bavaria and the federal government, Vanellus vanellus, as the lapwing is scientifically called, has long been listed as critically endangered.
“But the lapwing should definitely remain a Bavarian,” says Skorupa. That is why the LBV has now started a supra-regional species aid project. It mainly extends to the Lower Bavarian Gäuboden and the Isar valley near Dingolfing. “Because there we still have comparatively large populations with several hundred breeding pairs,” says Skorupa. In addition, the project, which is supported by the Ministry of Agriculture, aims to network local initiatives throughout Bavaria, such as those in Seefeld.
Spectacular courtship flights
The lapwing is actually a bird of wet meadows and bogs. It was once found along the Danube, the Isar and the Inn, but also the Altmühl, in the Franconian Aischgrund and on the other rivers in Bavaria. Its distinctive kiwit calls, from which its name derives, could be heard everywhere from March onwards. And with a bit of luck you could also watch its spectacular courtship flights, although its wide wings don’t look very elegant in flight. But it is impressive when the birds first fly steeply up, then drop from a great height and then fly up again just before the ground. Lapwings breed in colonies, the breeding season is from March to the end of June. They build their nests in the open country, on the ground, but the surrounding vegetation must not be too high. Since damp, natural meadows are now very rare, they now mostly switch to fields.
Modern agriculture, with its ever-growing fields and cleared landscapes, is the main reason for the dramatic losses in the past 50 years. “When the females lay their eggs from the end of March, work in the fields begins at the same time,” says biologist Skorupa. “Many clutches are then lost, they are plowed over or run over.” Usually unintentionally. “Farmers can’t see the grass-lined nests from their tall tractors,” says Skorupa. “They are simply too well camouflaged in the hollows in the ground for that.” But that’s not all. The lapwings are simply running out of food in the now monotonous agricultural landscapes in many places. As insect eaters, they are massively affected by the immense loss of insects there.
It depends on the farmers
As part of its species aid project, the LBV wants to promote lapwing-friendly agriculture, especially among farmers. “So-called lapwing islands or lapwing windows are very important,” says LBV man Skorupa. “So areas in the fields that are left free of crops and the lapwing.” Based on his experience, BN man Schorn says that these lapwing islands should be at least one hectare in size. In addition, the two call for a later and, above all, loose sowing so that the young can easily move back and forth between the germinating corn or cereal plants and slip between the seed rows. In addition, wet spots for the young lapwings are needed close to the nests, which cannot – like the parents – fly to a puddle or other watering place, at least not in the first few weeks.
The lapwing project has meanwhile started in Gäuboden and in the Isar valley near Dingolfing. There, LBV people, together with farmers, search the fields for pairs of lapwings and nests and fence them in so that the parents and their clutches are protected as well as possible. And there have already been a few farmers who create islands for the lapwings on their fields instead of cultivating every last square meter of them.