In January I wrote of my childhood wintertime memories listening to the haunting calls of curlews echoing for miles across the marsh after dark. My abiding springtime memories from that time are the call of lapwing, surely one of the harbingers of spring. It is now yet another endangered red-listed species and one I seldom see these days yet alone hear. These birds have become another casualty of changing farm practices, land use, human disturbance and the indiscriminate use of DDT which had a catastrophic adverse impact on birdlife in the 1960s.
I can still remember returning home from university in 1963 and walking my favourite routes across the marsh. I was completely unprepared for what I witnessed. Where once the dykes had abounded with birds and other forms of wildlife, the whole area was lifeless. The vegetation was stunted, there were no wild flowers and the water in the dykes had an unpleasant scum on the surface. The reason was immediately clear – after spraying the empty drums of DDT had simply been thrown into the dykes poisoning all wildlife. Whilst DDT was banned in North America in 1972, it took until 1986 for the UK to follow suit. Now 50 years on it has been discovered that DDT has still not broken down and continues to damage ecosystems, particularly aquatic ones and there are fears that it may be a reason driving certain diseases in humans, notably Alzheimer’s disease.
Today many are concerned about the use of Neonicotinoids in farming and the fear it may harm honey bees. Despite having been banned in Europe in 2018 they remain in use here to protect certain crops. Is this yet another ticking time bomb?
I am reminded of very different times – where now there is scarcity, then there was abundance and never more so than in the case of lapwings. In the immediate aftermath of WW2 times were hard for many communities and they scratched a living as best they could. Some collected plover eggs for which they were paid a shilling, the eggs being considered a great delicacy. These were sold in Leadenhall Street Market in London for a guinea each. It was perfectly legal to do so up until mid-April, as many eggs were simply destroyed during spring ploughing, after which the birds started all over again. When disturbed by foxes or dogs the parent birds could be seen hopping along the ground dragging a wing as though broken in an attempt to lure these animals away from the eggs or young. The greatest miracle was to watch a hatchling only minutes old scurrying away from the scrape seeking deeper cover.