It was coming toward dusk and my resident sea gull reminded me, in his subtle shrieking way,  that he hadn’t yet been served his afternoon snack. I found a heel of bread in the refrigerator, broke it into quarters and took it out into the cockpit. My gull plopped down behind the boat, anticipating this meager repast and scrutinizing me with his beady, yellow eye. I tossed all four pieces of bread into the water when, from across the fairway, I heard “DON’T FEED THE SEA GULLS!!! #@&*(%$# THEY S_T ALL OVER THE BOATS!!!##@@&&%^”

I have to admit that I do feed the birds and have taken much pleasure in this activity for many, many years. When we lived in an apartment, I fed the hummingbirds and sparrows. We often had a California Valley Quail stop by for a snack. When we lived in Brisbane Marina, I had a gull that waited for me to come home from work each afternoon. He would be perched on one of the street lights in the parking lot, recognize my car as I drove in, and then swoop down behind my boat to wait patiently until his snack was served.. I called him ‘Spot’, because he did. Spot, that is, but not very much. He later had a girl friend who I named Dot, because she did too.

Sea gulls are magnificent creatures, living as long as 30 years. They are not unintelligent creatures. We once made a trip to the
Farrallon
Islands with a friend of ours who was a member of the Farrallon Patrol. We were lucky enough to have a private tour of the island from one of the naturalists who was stationed there. He told us that when the gulls are nesting, the scientists sometimes need to band the birds or otherwise handle them. The sea gulls have such acute vision and keen memory that they recognize individuals who interfere with their nesting. The birds will dive bomb any scientist who has previously handled them. The way the staff overcomes this problem is to wear disguises such as ski masks, rubber pig noses, Groucho nose and glasses, or, any combination of the above.

Sweetie used to love to feed the Canada Geese, delighting in the feel of their leathery black bills as they took bread right out of his outstretched hand. That is, until they started waiting for him each afternoon in the cockpit of our trawler. Geese are big birds and our cockpit is small. They eventually forgave him for shutting down the free grub and brought their goslings around for inspections. Clever birds….

My sea gull will allow only one other gull to share in his handout, presumably his wife. I can’t tell the difference between the sexes in humans anymore, let alone birds that are identical in appearance. These two birds have never made a mess on our boat. They do like to perch on flat surfaces, but I think they would do that with or without the occasional hand out.

So far as my rude neighbors are concerned; let them eat cake! I’ll just have to be more careful ….