Beware Seagulls on Acid

Yep, this sounds like something out of a Hitchcock movie but it is in fact true. Not only that but I actually witnessed it over the weekend without really knowing what I was looking at.

Last Sunday morning started in much the same way that most Sunday morning's start.

I hopped onto my bike at just before 10am in order to get down to the supermarket in time for it to open so that I could beat the crowds.

As is the case when any man goes shopping, my trip was efficiency personified. I blitzed round the aisles, avoided unnecessary chit chat with the staff at the checkout and cycled home with an arm full of groceries in well under an hour.

Waiting for me on the doorstep when I got home was my youngest boy (2-years old this week) and my wife chatting to a neighbour.

My son is just learning to talk and is very much at the stage of saying what he sees but he has a particular fascination with birds (the feathered kind, I'm sure the other type will come in due course). So as I pulled up and dismounted my bike the first thing he says to me is "bird" and he points behind.

"oh, yeah", I say "there is a bird. It's a seagull"

Now, we don't live particularly near the coast - about 45 miles as the crow flies (or in this case the seagull) but it's not uncommon to see the odd gull around.

However, as I stand there with my son he keeps saying "bird" and the more I look the more seagulls I see.
At first, just the ones that are hovering fairly close but then as I adjust my focus I see that there are hundreds of the damn things circling in the distance.

It was weird, I thought but we went inside and I didn't pay it much more attention.

Later the same day we decided to go out for a drink at a local pub and having finished our beverages we took a walk through the local playing fields towards a children's playground.

As we walked, we were accosted by more winged beasts but this time far smaller and far more numerous - flying ants!.

Again, the ants weren't a major problem and as the kids zoomed down slides and bounced on see-saws all was soon forgotten until...

I came across this tweet earlier this evening

In a eureka like moment the 2 instances suddenly came together and I realised what I had witnessed on Sunday was the equivalent of a seagull rave complete with class-A drugs in the form of flying-ants.

Apparently the appearance of the ants is triggered when the queens decide to up and leave their nest in order to try and get as far away as possible from their own offspring in order to avoid inbreeding - a tactic that several human populations in the UK may wish to consider (I've seen the big-eared boys).

As she flies she releases a pheromone and this acts as a trigger forever randy male ant within a mile radius to take to the wing in pursuit of some ant totty.

The gulls are well aware of this bonanza and more than just that, reports suggest the birds are somewhat addicted to eating the ants which of course contain formic acid.

Once the birds eat enough of the ants and the acid they start to behave as if they've had one too many and observers have claimed they see gulls dying by the dozens walking in front of cars just to get one more hit of their drug of choice.

This feeding frenzy only lasts a few days every year so I'll be sure to keep an eye out for any such lude behaviour this time next year.

But readers beware if you spot a swarm of flying ants expect a flock of stoner seagulls to be hot in pursuit!