Keeping an eye on feeding chicks

Photographer Simon Pettman has captured the moment fragile new life takes its first anxious steps.

The 51-year-old, of Market Way in Canterbury, witnessed moorhens feed their hatchlings at the River Stour by Kingsmead Field.

“I was lucky to see these moorhen chicks on what was probably one of their first outings on the river since hatching,” said Simon.

“Their bald heads give them all quite a comical appearance.

“The two parents looked quite stressed trying to keep discipline and feed them all – something I sympathise with.”

Simon Pettman’s pictures of a moorhen with its newly hatched chicks