New research suggests the answer could be as simple as eye contact.
Ocean City using birds of prey to scare off aggressive seagulls
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Scientists at the University of Exeter in England wanted to know if the birds would be slower to snatch food if they knew a human was watching them. So, they put a bag of chips on the ground and waited.
They discovered, on average, it took seagulls 21 seconds longer to swoop in if a person was staring them down.
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Another observation? Only 27 of the 74 birds they watched even came near the food.
In turn, they say a small, and aggressive, minority of the seagull population might be giving the rest a bad name.