Why seagulls are actually terrifying, it's okay to be afraid
Beach pigeons: nature's cleanup crew–better known as seagulls. If you've ever been near a beach you've likely come into contact with seagulls. As long as you don't pull out French fries or any other food, they mind their business but when the smell of food wafts up to their tiny nostrils, prepare to be harassed. Although, there's no legal document that can keep seagulls from dive bombing you in hopes to bully you into giving up your cheese puffs, these birds are more terrifying than one might realize.
Animal enthusiast Mamadou Ndiaye, who has a habit of telling the public terrible unexpected things about the most adorable looking animals. This time is no different. While some people might be afraid of seagulls, many just find the to be a noisy price to pay for enjoying a day at the beach. Thanks for Finding Nemo, they're also seen as adorably possessive of things that don't belong to them. But Ndiaye reveals that the birds are not just crumb snatches but can be aggressively violent to humans and other animals for little to no reason outside of feeling a bit snack-y.
French Fries GIF by ViralHogGiphy
It's immediately clear upon introduction of the bird that people are in for a rude awakening as Ndiaye says, "out of all the animals that can bring the world to its knees, seagulls might have an actual argument." He describes the bird as an avian antichrist, and it's not because he has some unresolved trauma around a childhood seagull attack. The information that follows is genuinely concerning enough that seagulls probably need to be added to a watchlist for Homeland Security.
"They'll swallow anything that isn't nailed down. This includes other birds like ducklings, starlings and they'll even past tense and prey on pigeons. To rodents, rabbits and even squirrels, seagulls have no morals and no gag reflex," Ndiaye says flatly while a video of a seagull eating different animals plays behind him.
Seagulls Beware GIFGiphy
How does a bird go from stealing fries to eating other species children? That's certainly a leap that many people didn't see coming but the disturbing facts didn't end there. Just when you think the little devil birds can't get much crueler, they tell you to hold their chips. It gets worse. Much worse and there's no way of unhearing the information, people have tried. Legend has it that viewers of the video have not closed their mouths since hearing about seagull hijinks. Now we can all have nightmares.
On top of them scraping the blubber off of baby whales likely causing an increase in deceased whales in Patagonia, they apparently stalk pregnant seals.
Ndiaye calmly explains, "seagulls will also spawn camp by stalking pregnant seals and swarming the baby and gouging its eyes out. Just so they can eat the blind defenseless baby seals alive and like flying hyenas they start from the softest spots. Some seagulls will also cannibalize the chicks of their own species. They'll also mob other birds like puffins and literally steal the food right out of their throats before they can feed their family."
It's a lot to unpack about seagulls and even though the video is less than two minutes long, it seemed to go on much longer much to the horror of viewers. Though the video did make some people feel justified in their fear of seagulls, with one person writing, "I’ve always hated seagulls…. They’re horrifying and annoying, I hate the sound of them. One of the reasons I’m one of few people who would NOT want to live right on the water, f*cking seagulls."
Sf Giants Baseball GIF by San Francisco GiantsGiphy
"I am SHOCKED! WHAT!?!?!?! SEAGULLS ARE THAT CRUEL???? OMG!" another says.
"as someone who lives on the north Wales coast I fluffing hate sea gulls!! i saw man get a chunk of his lip bit off because a seagull swooped and tried to get the food he was eating!" someone else reveals.
"Whaaaat!! uggghh never gonna see seagulls in the same way again," one person writes. Neither will anyone else who stumbles across his video, unfortunately.