When you hear or read the word murmuration, you probably think of Starlings and the incredible sight of thousands of those birds flying though the evening sky in perfect unison. But it isn’t only Starlings that execute such amazing aerial displays; many other species of bird perform similar feats of synchronised flying and, on Monday, I was privileged to see just such a spectacle.

As soon as I arrived at the Cardiff Bay Barrage, I saw a large flock of birds flying around the area outside the Barrage, on the edge of the Bristol Channel. Luckily for me, the birds settled on one of the mudflats and began feeding. In my almost ten years of living in the area, I had never seen so many waders doing this; they usually feed on mudflats north of Cardiff.

The flock must have been several hundred strong and consisted of three species of wader, Black-tailed godwit, Knot and Dunlin. For 45 minutes, I watched and listened to and photographed these stunning birds, sharing my delight and wonder with a man who was out walking his dog and who’d never seen anything like this sight in his many years of living locally.

Then, for some unknown reason, the Barrage operations staff opened more of the sluice gates that allow water in Cardiff Bay to flow out in to the Bristol Channel, creating a small wave that swiftly encroached on the area of mud where the flock was feeding, and eventually covering it completely. As the wave reached them, the birds took to the air, creating an ever expanding cloud of flying birds. As one, they flew around the outer Barrage area, looking for another place to land but there was nowhere. For perhaps ten minutes, they swirled high into the air, then back down towards the water, wheeling left and right in perfect harmony, before abandoning their search for more mudflats and heading northwards along the coast. It was a sublime aerial symphony that I will never forget.