I am stretching out my arms and embracing that Leaving Cert weather on my skin. How’re we all keeping cool? Couple ice cubes in the glass of water, t-shirts and shorts, fans on full blast? This month’s bird is partial to hanging around the seaside in summer, and they look it, too, with that little sunburned spot on their crowns. But these aren’t sun-bum amateurs; their elegant dives put your usual Forty Foot cannonballers to shame. We’re talking about the (Northern) Gannet (Morus bassanus), known as Gainead as Gaeilge.
You have to watch your step as you pick your way down the salt-encrusted steps that lead to the sea. The water is bottle green and laps hungrily against the old concrete, ornamented with seaweed and shells. In the distance there are the cries of seabirds, all pushing in on one another for control of the skies. A lone shape catches your eye as they soar overhead, wings extended. Their blue eyes glint in the summer sun, the light rippling over them as it does on the water below. Their feathers are bright white, almost searing your eyes, save for the ones on their head; toasted marshmallow coloured, and the black wing tips like they’d been dipped in ink. The bird circles upwards, and time slows as they pose in the air, wings at stark angles, beak pointed, before they dive at speed into the water and disappear with a splash.
That lone bird was a strange anomaly for us, we usually spot gannets on our faithful Saltee. Huge rocks, separated from the main portion of the island by channels of seawater, serve as temporary refuges for the various migrating birds — the gannets among them. You smell them long before you see them, the rocks are usually smeared white by the time we take our trip every year. And the colony can raise a racket that rivals rush hour traffic in Dublin. I think the group we see on Saltee is massive, but it pales in comparison to the largest colony on Little Skellig, which boasts 39,800 nesting pairs and a few thousand more non-breeding birds — a bigger population than some of our counties have.
They build nests using grasses and seaweed and lay a single egg that’ll be incubated for six weeks. When the chicks hatch, they’ll be fed for three months, starting with a diet of regurgitated, semi-digested fish that they have to go spelunking down their parents’ throat for. Once the chicks are old enough, they’ll throw themselves off the cliff in the hopes of reaching the water below. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance where they either make it or don’t. If they survive, they will spend five years in their juvenile stage until they reach four or five years old, at which point they’ll be adults and can live for a further 17 years, (though the oldest gannet lived to be 37 years, 4 months, and 16 days old!) You’d think the cliff jumping would be the biggest test of survival for these birds, but unfortunately, that’s not all they have to face. In Scotland, these birds come under threat of the Guga Hunt; it’s an old cultural practice where 10 men travel to where gannets are nesting and swipe the juveniles right out of the air. The young birds’ meat is considered a delicacy and they are killed before they even get a real chance of life. Though there have been limits imposed on the number of birds that can be hunted, there have been calls to outlaw the practice entirely as the numbers of seabirds globally are decreasing.
If I was a hunter, I would go after the juveniles too; full grown gannets are Herculean in stature. They are Ireland’s largest seabird, and the largest seabird that can be found in the North Atlantic — they can be up to a metre long from tip to tail and boast an impressive wingspan of 180 cm, as big as an Osprey’s. To achieve this, they need to dive for the most nutritious fish; another thing that brings these birds fame. They give themselves plenty of height to find their mark — up to 70 metres or so — and then dive from anywhere between 11 and 60 metres. When they dive, their bodies are straight and rigid, with wings tucked tight but still angled back so they extend beyond the tail. They pierce the water like arrows at speeds of up to 100 km/h, sometimes diving as deep as 25m. Their bodies are highly streamlined for this task: they have powerful neck muscles to withstand the force of the dive, nostrils that can be shut to prevent water getting in, and eyes that are protected by membranes like goggles. They also have numerous air sacs dotted around their bodies which can transfer air to their lungs with one muscle flex.
Due to this bigness, they much prefer steep cliffs with lots of ledges for their colonies than level ground, since the drop from a height makes it easier for them to take off. The name bassanus actually refers to Bass Rock off the east coast of Scotland, which hosts the largest colony of gannets (up to 150,000 individuals). An impressive comeback, since this population fell in the 19th century to as little as 4000 birds due to mass hunting. The name Morus is derived from the Ancient Greek word moros, meaning ‘stupid’ or ‘foolish’ for the lack of fear shown by the birds in this family — gannets and boobies — which leads to them easily being captured by humans. Though a more substantial threat is that of bird flu, which spreads like wildfire through close-knit seabird colonies. In 2023 in the UK, the population fell by up to a third because of it; for reference, a similar percentage of people died of the Black Death in Europe in the mid 1300s.
Gannets have a name derived from Ancient Greek and also appear as part of one of the myths! In Homer’s Odyssey, the sea goddess Leucothea appeared “in the likeness of a Gannet” and bade the shipwrecked Odysseus to discard his cloak and raft in favour of her veil, which would save his life and enable him to reach land. Gannets can be found around the Mediterranean so it’s no wonder such a striking bird found its way into their stories. (The name gannet actually comes from the Old English ganot, meaning “gander”, and how could you not!) Once you cross into the Southern Hemisphere, you’ll encounter some other birds in the gannet’s family, Sulidae, the boobies! (You can giggle at this if you’re twelve.) These are iconic birds, known for their bright blue or red feet, depending on the species. But there has been a handful of sightings of brown boobies off the Irish west Cork, and one anomaly on a beach in Wicklow in 2020, back when nature was healing. Maybe as climate change continues to wreak havoc, we’ll see more birds from warmer climates making their way to us on their own personal odysseys.
It’s Pride month, so that means it’s time to celebrate love, and gannets have a mating displays that’s sure to melt your heart. Pairs who’ve been apart for a while nuzzle beaks in a dance known as “fencing”, a very cute kissy ritual. So if you wanna get a gander of these beautiful lovebirds, keep your eyes on the skies when you’re at the beach, and you may just feel time stop yourself as a gannet rears up for a deep dive.