Scottish Seabird Centre

First Gannets of 2025 Spotted on The Bass Rock

The Scottish Seabird Centre have announced that the first gannets of the year have returned to the Bass Rock. The island, home to the largest colony of Northern gannets on the planet, is located just off the coast of North Berwick, less than an hour from Edinburgh. The gannets left the Rock in October to spend the winter in warmer seas, some travelling as far as the west coast of Africa. Their return to the Bass is a welcome sign of spring as we move towards the start of the seabird breeding season.

Visiting the Bass Rock in peak breeding season is one of the greatest seabird spectacles in the world and a bucket list trip for many wildlife photographers. The Scottish Seabird Centre run exclusive landing tips to the island, allowing you to immerse yourself in the sights, sounds, and smells of this incredible nesting colony.

These trips were sadly halted during the outbreak of avian flu in 2023, and again in 2024 due to storm damage on the island. But the Centre are delighted that the landing trips will be able to resume this year.

Gannet expert and Bass Rock landing guide Maggie Sheddan said “It’s always wonderful to see the gannets returning to the Rock. No two years are ever the same, but the colony is much changed recently having reduced by around a third following the 2023 outbreak of HPAI. The upside of this is seeing the fascinating ways in which the nesting habits have evolved. It’s been particularly exciting to see new behaviours as surviving adults make new pair bonds, and we begin to see signs of recovery within the colony.”

You can experience this wildlife wonder from the Centre’s various boat trips, via their interactive live cameras, or on an unforgettable landing trip to the island.

For more information, or to book a boat trip, visit: https://www.seabird.org/boats

Image credits and captions:

· A Northern Gannet on the Bass Rock © Jamie McDermaid

· The Iconic Bass Rock © Greg Macvean

High res images available to download here.

Note these images are free to use for this story only.

ENDS

For further press information:

· Jess Thompson, Marketing Manager, email marketing@seabird.org, tel: +44(0)1620 890202.

Notes for Editors

· The Scottish Seabird Centre is an award-winning marine conservation and education charity whose purpose is to inspire and educate people about the Scottish marine environment and motivate people to care for it by supporting conservation projects.

· In May 2025 the Charity will celebrate its 25th anniversary of the opening of its Visitor Centre doors to the public and over the years has won multiple awards for tourism and sustainability. It has led a range of high-profile conservation and education projects including the SOS Puffin initiative in the Firth of Forth.

· Follow the Scottish Seabird Centre on Facebook/ScottishSeabirdCentre. Twitter @SeabirdCentre and Instagram @seabirdcentre

· For more information on the Scottish Seabird Centre visit www.seabird.org

Key Facts about Scotland’s marine environment

· Scotland has over 18,000km of coastline, in excess of 900 islands, 61% of the UK total sea area.

· The area of Scotland’s seas is about 6 times the land mass of Scotland.

· Scotland’s seas support an amazing diversity of wildlife with over 6,500 species recorded.

· A third of Europe’s breeding seabirds are found in Scotland.

· Seabirds are one of the world’s most threatened groups of vertebrates and one in three species are globally threatened with extinction, including populations of Atlantic Puffin (Fratercula arctica) and Black-legged Kittiwakes (Rissa tridactyla) which are enjoyed by visitors to the Firth of Forth.

· Important marine species include basking sharks, dolphins, porpoises and seals. About 35% of Europe’s harbour (or common) seal population also occur in UK waters with 83% of these found around Scotland’s coast.

· Underneath the water, Scotland supports important marine habitats such as cold-water coral, kelp forests and flame shell beds (an important blue carbon resource).

· Our oceans are important natural resource for combatting the effect of climate change. 83% of global carbon cycle is circulated through the world’s oceans and our coastal habitats account for around 50% of the total carbon sequestered in ocean sediments.

· Healthy seas, however, have huge potential to provide natural solutions to the climate emergency by locking up carbon and helping the planet to cool.

· In the last 50 years we have lost 2% of the oxygen in our oceans as a direct result of climate change, this is already having a devastating impact on our marine eco-systems and if left unchecked will be catastrophic for food security the world over.