Wadden Sea (Denmark)

The Wadden Sea National Park was established in 2010 on the west coast of Jutland, in south-western Denmark, and protects some 1,466 km². It is Denmark's largest national park and comprises the tidal flats, the salt marshes and the islands of Fanø, Mandø and Rømø.

It is the northern end of the Wadden Sea, the largest unbroken system of tidal flats in the world, which extends from the Netherlands to here. With every tide enormous expanses of mud are laid bare, and their biological productivity supports millions of waders migrating between the Arctic and Africa. Important populations of harbour seal and grey seal haul out on its sandbanks.

Its most celebrated phenomenon is the sort sol, the black sun: in spring and autumn, at dusk, flocks of hundreds of thousands of starlings gather over the marshes and trace shifting formations in the sky before settling in the reedbeds, darkening the light of sunset. In June 2014 the Danish sector was added to the Wadden Sea World Heritage property, inscribed in 2009 for the Dutch and German sectors and extended in 2011 with that of Hamburg.