Red Knot

The red knot, or huahou, is a stocky Arctic-breeding wader whose New Zealand numbers have roughly halved since the early 1990s. In non-breeding plumage it is plain grey above and white below, with a medium-length dark bill, a lightly barred white rump and a pale wingbar in flight. Breeding birds turn reddish on the face, breast and belly. The great knot is larger, with a streaked breast and heavier bill.

Red knots use large harbours and estuaries in the North Island, mainly Farewell Spit and Southland in the South Island, and are regular on the Chatham Islands. They breed on high Arctic tundra and leave New Zealand from March to early April. Flocks feed on tidal flats by probing for small bivalves such as pipi and cockles, which are swallowed whole and crushed in the gizzard. They often roost with bar-tailed godwits.

The New Zealand classification is At Risk – Declining (DOC 2021); the population fell from almost 60,000 in the early 1990s to about 30,000 in the 2010s. Many birds stop over at Bohai Bay in China, where tidal-flat reclamation is a major threat. Farewell Spit, the Firth of Thames, the Manawatū River estuary and the large northern harbours hold flocks in summer.