Here’s how to get food-snatching seagulls to leave you alone – NBC Bay Area

Sweet talk won't get you far if you want to scare off a seagull trying to snatch your food. Try shouting.

Researchers set out to find if a man's voice was enough to deter bandit gulls from their penchant for purloining food in seaside towns and found it was effective if delivered with more urgency.

"Talking might stop them in their tracks, but shouting is more effective at making them fly away,” said Neeltje Boogert of the University of Exeter's Center for Ecology and Conservation at the Cornwall campus.

The researchers placed fries in a Tupperware box in towns across the southwest coast of England and tested how 61 European herring gulls reacted to recordings of a robin's song, a male voice saying, “No, stay away, that’s my food," and a voice shouting those words.

Previous researc