December 9, 2018 — They squawk, swoop in to steal food right out of unsuspecting hands, and drop bombs from their posterior. Seagulls: a key symbol of Croatia’s coastline.
And a total nuisance.
Seagulls are blamed for everything from excessive noise and garbage-strewn streets to attacks on children. Some evidence reportedly suggests their excrement contains antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria if present in drinking water.
A new program aims at keeping the birds’ population down by swapping their eggs with fakes.
The “My Island” association is touring the coast, from Istria to most recently Zadar, presenting its “Introduction of Controls and Suppressions of Seagull Nests and the Assessment of the Risk of Excessive Population for Human Health,” according to various reports.
The plan first calls for the elimination of the birds’ food sources, namely wide-open garbage containers. Then the seagulls’ nests and regular habitats are observed via drone. Once a proper inventory has been taken, their real eggs are replaced with fakes.
Seagulls casually return to their nests and continue about their business, completely clueless they’re sitting on plastic eggs. When the incubation period is over, the birds reportedly leave the territory, hopefully for less-populated habitats. An added perk: the fake eggs are reusable.
Success requires coordination between local governments, private companies and residents, according to Nataša Basanić Čuš, who coordinated the project for “Healthy City Poreč.”
“It’s important to understand that this is a long-term and complex process,” she said, according to Nasi Skojli.
The tactic has lowered the number of nests atop Poreč’s tourism-oriented structures by 60 percent, and the overall number of seagulls are down by 1,150.
Seagulls have a relatively high intelligence, adapt quickly to urban environs, lack a natural predator, multiply quickly and present a danger to people via the bird turds they drop from the sky, which may contain salmonella or e. coli.
Check out more of TCN’s Lifestyle coverage.
