Birdwatching UK: The Northern or Atlantic Gannet Chicks Pictures

Like all baby birds, gannet chicks are delightful to photograph and to watch as they grow. Birdwatchers at RSPB Bempton Cliffs in Yorkshire can get exceptionally close to them and it is especially interesting to be able to see the changes in the chicks as they develop.

At first they appear as little more than white bundles of fluff glimpsed under an adult. When sitting beside an adult they can look deceptively large, nearly as big as the parent in fact. Most of their bulk though is down, just fluff. The chicks darken as they get older and as their feathers develop with the head gradually changing from white to grey to dark grey. By the time the birds are ready to fly they appear almost completely black with white speckling.

In this state they will fly with the adults to the Mediterranean and they will stay there for about 3 years. The breeding adults will return to the same spot to nest next year. When they are around 3 years old they will return with the adults although they are not ready to breed. Gannets arn't fully mature until they are about 10. These juveniles can be easily identified flying around the ganneries. They have much more black on their wings, it is only when they are completely sexually mature that the gannets have a pure white appearance with black only on the edges of the wings.

This photo journal is a follow-on article from my previous Gannets At Bempton page, and it shows the different stages the gannet chicks go through as they grow. In the colonies the eggs hatch at different times so there is always a colourful range of chicks in view.

If you enjoy your visit, don't forget to vote up the web page and recommend it to your friends.

Thanks to everyone for their interest and kind comments. Can I ask you NOT to pin this page or any of the photographs please. All images are copyrighted to me and there are serious implications regarding copyright and Pinterest - if you read their terms and conditions they say they are permitted to sell images that appear there - I need to hold onto my copyright.

many thanks for your understanding.

Once hatched, the gannet chick appears as a white downy bundle under one of the adult birds.

To begin with the chicks look as big as the adults because of the amount of down they have. They have no feathers as yet and are not water-proof so they spend quite some time being sheltered by an adult.

As they get older they start to grow dark feathers to replace the white down.

The head stay white and downy longest giving the chick a bit of a lamb-like appearance.

The feathers come in much darker and the head turns grey then becomes darker just before the chick is due to fledge.

Juvenile gannets will return to the nesting sites where they were born when are about 3 years old. They have more black on their wings than fully mature gannets. Some describe the black and white patterning on the wings as piano-key marking. This juvenile has the beginnings of the peachy nape and head but is not fully sexually mature.

Gannet chicks are fed by regurgitation by the adults. The chick will beg for food, the adult stretches her neck up and refurgitates food she has ingested earlier, then fed directly into the chick's mouth. Sometimes it looks as if she is swallowing the whole of the chick's beak.

• The gannet is the largest of the European seabirds.
• It belongs to the Sulidae family of the Pelecaniformer order.
• It's species designation is Morus brassna and commonly called Gannet.
• An adult gannet is about 35-38 inches long and has a wingspan of over 5 feet.
• It will weight roughly 6-7 lbs.
• Adults are white with a peachy blush on head and nape of neck and black on wing edges.
• Found in coastal regions of Europe including Iceland and northern Mediterranean.
• They breed from March to October in large colonies on cliff edges.
• They feed on fish they catch by diving into the sea from great heights.
• They lay only one egg that hatches in 43-45 days.
• Both adults incubate the egg.
• The chick fledges after about 12 weeks.