A stunning sight - the 'whirling wader spectacle'

The birds migrate from the Arctic during the winter - and tens of thousands gather on mudflats in Snettisham.

Trevor Mayes from Dickleburgh was up at half four last week to capture the latest 'Snettisham Spectacular'.

From late summer to early winter, tens of thousands of wading birds gather on the mudflats where they roost overnight.  And on especially high tides, vast flocks of Knot, Dunlin and Oystercatchers take to the air en masse as the water covers the mudflats. 

It's Trevor's second time seeing it, "It's brilliant, when the tide is coming in it pushes all the birds to the coastline, and because they can't get any further they absolutely just erupt and you're looking at tens of thousands of birds. It's quite amazing, the sound of all the wings beats, the noise it sort of sounds like a jet engine."

"You can't really describe what it's like until you actually see it," Trevor adds, "When you tell people it's loads of bird that take off, they go oh yeah, but they estimated 80 thousand knot were there when I went.  It's such a spectacle, we are just lucky to have something like this here in Norfolk."

It was the last spectacle of this year - the next will be in the spring.

Photos and videos all Trevor Mayes Photography

For information about the spectacles in the spring https://www.rspb.org.uk/days-o...