Red-wattled Lapwing

How to identify

Field marks

1. Red wattles in front of the eyes
2. Red bill with a black tip
3. Long-legged; legs and feet yellow
4. Conspicuous white wing-bar in flight

Male, female and young

Sexes have similar plumage.

Voice

Loud calls by day and night, sounding like “did-he-do-it”.

Where and when it's recorded

Busiest months: February · Most records: India, Thailand, United Arab Emirates

Red-wattled Lapwing has been recorded at 705 of the 8,276 birding hotspots we track, in 23 countries and regions.

Records by month Northern Hemisphere

Where it's recorded most

1. GKVK CampusIndia8,681 records
2. Kanha NP – Mukki ZoneIndia6,635 records
3. Bharatpur – Keoladeo Ghana NPIndia4,162 records

Countries and regions with the most records

IndiaThailandUnited Arab EmiratesSri LankaSingaporeNepalCambodiaMalaysia

eBird records via GBIF up to 2024-12-31. A record means someone listed it; more records partly mean more birders, not more birds.

About

The red-wattled lapwing (Vanellus indicus) is an Asian lapwing or large plover, a wader in the family Charadriidae. Like other lapwings they are ground birds that are incapable of perching. Their characteristic loud alarm calls are indicators of human or animal movements and the sounds have been variously rendered as did he do it or pity to do it leading to the colloquial name of did-he-do-it bird.

Excerpt from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0 · authors · Read more on Wikipedia

Questions