Knots landing

How and when to photograph the world-class Snettisham Spectacular

- David Tipling

There is a place on our shores which hosts one of the world’s great nature spectacles, attracting birders and photographers from far and wide: the autumn gathering of red knot (knot). The Wash, a vast tidal bay separating Norfolk from Lincolnshire and bordering the North Sea, attracts over 100,000 of these wading birds, a species that nests in the Arctic. Many use our coasts and estuaries to feed in winter but in autumn freshly arrived from the far north, they gather to take advantage of rich feeding grounds that the mudflats offer.

The spectacle occurs on Spring Tides which have nothing to do with spring, but occur when the sun, Earth and moon are aligned forming a strong gravitational pull creating the highest tides. When these occur the mud and large parts of the salt marsh are inundated, pushing the knot and other waders – notably oystercatchers – to roost on gravel pits on the Norfolk side of the Wash at Snettisham. This RSPB reserve has a long foreshore overlooking the estuary from where you can watch the spectacle unfold. As the tide covers the mud, huge numbers of birds are pushed ever closer to the edge until eventually vast flocks take to the air and descend on to their roosting banks and islands on the gravel pit. Here the knot form rivers of birds moving restlessly as they surge in tightly packed groups, before eventually settling down until the tide starts to fall. Once mud is exposed, they leave in groups to resume feeding out on the Wash.

KIT LIST

Tripod If you wish to experiment using slow shutter speeds to create pleasing blurs of the knot at roost, when some parts of the flock surge and other birds remain stationary, then a tripod becomes essential for the slow shutter speeds required.