Gulls in Argentina have learned to land on Southern Right Whales as the whales come to the surface to breathe. The gulls then peck at the whales’ backs, causing wounds from which the gulls feed. The solution? Kill the gulls.
There has to be a better way to deal with this, no?
Corey is a New Yorker who lived most of his life in upstate New York but has lived in Queens since 2008. He's only been birding since 2005 but has garnered a respectable life list by birding whenever he wasn't working as a union representative or spending time with his family. He lives in Forest Hills with Daisy and Desmond Shearwater. His bird photographs have appeared on the Today Show, in Birding, Living Bird Magazine, Bird Watcher's Digest, and many other fine publications. He is also the author of the American Birding Association Field Guide to the Birds of New York.
Why don’t we just release more domestic cats to prey on the gulls that eat the whales? Sounds like a good wildlife management solution to me.
If this is the only solution, my problem is I doubt most of the people hunting the gulls can even figure out the difference between the gulls and other birds, and if they can, the common ones from the not-so-common. We’ll probably lose some vagrants and less common species in the aftermath of this bloodshed.