Grey seal

Grey seal

Autumn for the grey seals is a busy time. They come ashore at traditional rookeries to give birth to pups and then mate before returning to the sea. This is especially true for those on the small windswept island of Farne. Gordon Buchanan follows the ups and downs for us on Autumnwatch.

View a slideshow of your amazing grey seal pictures in the Flickr group.

Watch all the best grey seal action from the shows.

Species information

Nothing describes the largest British mammal, with its characteristic flat 'Roman' nose and thick neck, better than the translation of its scientific name Halichoerus grypus – literally 'hook-nosed sea-pig'.

Coming face-to-face with a grey seal can be quite unnerving and even a little dangerous. They can reach some enormous sizes – up to 2.5m long and over 300kg. That's a lot of animal. To reach such sizes takes a lot of fish, especially cod. Their size makes them look clumsy on the shore. But it's a different story out at sea where they make very elegant and graceful swimmers. You'll often see them 'bottling', floating with their head sticking out of the water.

Being bigger is better in a grey seal colony as the larger bulls (males) can have a harem of more than ten cows (females). Trying to grab a chance to mate with the cows often leads to violent and ferocious clashes among the bulls, so stay well clear!

Seeing these great animals haul ashore during the autumn is quite a spectacle. It's also very noisy as grey seals produce a wonderful array of barks, hisses and snarls. The pups' coats remain white for around two weeks before moulting to become blue-grey covered with spots and blotches.

With around 50% of the world's grey seal population living around the British coasts, there is plenty of opportunity to see these great animals as they come ashore during the autumn. Try rocky shores and islands around Scotland and the north and west of England. Don't forget though that for ten months of the year all these seals remain out at sea.

How to help

Observe from a safe distance at designated sites. Follow the advice from the RSPCA if you come across a injured or stranded seal.

Monday 27 October

Let Gordon introduce us to the Farne Islands and one 'lucky' seal pup.

Finding Nemo

With all those seal pups it can be difficult to identify individuals. Meet Nemo, a very special pup who has been trying to swim in the icy waters two weeks before he really should. How will he cope in the coming weeks?

Too many pups...

A mother grey seal is suckling three pups. Only one of them is hers. This is very dangerous for the pups, including our Nemo. Gordon believes this is the first time such strange behaviour has been caught on film... but he's not particularly happy about it.

Stormy weather

One of the biggest threats to these grey seals is the weather – boiling seas and cold winds. Storms can be a dangerous time for the pups.

Losing Nemo...

Is Nemo's mum losing him to another female seal? Gordon hopes not as it could spell disaster for the young Nemo. Watch all the drama in this video.