Tidal Bank Landscape

This is a landscape in an intertidal beach. It is also known as a tidal flat and is part of the marine coast between the high and low tide marks. It is a wide intertidal beach area that slopes gently towards the sea and is submerged at high tide and exposed at low tide. Every year, China’s coastal areas receive more than 2 billion tons of sand and mud transported from the Yellow River, Changjiang (Yangtze River) and Zhujiang (Pearl River); as a result, tidal banks are widely developed. There are two main types of tidal banks: (1) tidal banks in estuaries and deltas, such as the coasts north of Jiangsu Province and west of Bohai; and (2) tidal banks that form from sand and mud transported by currents along the coast and deposited in concealed bays, such as those along the coasts from Hangzhou Bay to north of the mouth of the Minjiang River (Fig. 23).

Fig. 23

Tidal bank landscape