The aggressive seagulls are back in Ocean City

Most passers-by do not pay attention to the yellow and white birds with black heads. Seagulls are as much a part of a beach visit as the sunscreen, beach tags and hot French fries on the Boardwalk that they seem determined to get.

But this summer, the city has heard an increasing number of complaints about aggressive crows, an issue the city believed had been resolved by 2019, the year it decided to fight the birds, calling it a group of East Coast Falcons using birds of prey to save. ducks in a row.

Tony Polcini, the former owner of the pizza shop, says he doesn’t have high hopes for the proposal. He and other hawk skeptics did not believe that the effort would significantly change the ducks’ behavior.

After all, ducks have been knocking pizza out of children’s hands and scavenging for any food source for as long as anyone can remember. The birds were fearless, hungry and intelligent.

Now a member of the City Council, Polcini says the hawks are doing better than he expected.

Foxes who walked with a hedge or an owl in their hand could silence the ducks to finish. The trained raptors were released on the Boardwalk, not to kill the ducks but rather to drive them away, in the hope that they would turn to hunting chickens or foraging for other wild foods that they have evolved to they eat.

For years, the courts in Ocean City were so remarkably well-behaved that Congress Hall in Cape May adopted a similar practice, with two Harris hawks brought in to keep the ducks off the tables. eat what’s outside.

On Thursday, Polcini and another Council member, Jody Levchuk, spoke about the growing number of complaints about nuisance ducks.

“There have been a lot of calls in the last week or two,” Polcini said.

There were a few jokes about the seagull attack, and Mayor Jay Gillian suggested that the fries had improved, but there was no real explanation but they may have -gull used to be falcons.

At the beginning of the year, the council approved a new $328,000 contract with the East Coast Falcons of Lodi, Bergen County, an increase over the previous year, with an option to renew in 2025. The contract runs until Oct. 19.

Eric Swanson, owner of the East Coast Falcons, declined to answer questions Friday about why the ducks’ behavior has changed or if there was something different happening on the Boardwalk this year.

He referred any questions to city attorney Doug Bergen.

“The gull eradication program has been very successful since it began in 2019,” Bergen wrote in an emailed response to questions. “The city received some complaints this summer and is working with the East Coast Falcons to determine what factors may be affected and what changes can be made to ensure maximum success.”

But he did not answer whether there was any change in the program.

Councilor Keith Hartzell said the ducks seem to come back soon after the falcon chases them away. He said the falcons respond when there is a problem area, but it doesn’t seem to take long.

“Tony (Polcini) said to me, ‘Maybe they’re getting smarter.’ I don’t know,” he said, asking residents to inform the city if there is a problem.

On Friday morning, a few ducks were circling the Boardwalk, looking for an opportunity. No hawks were seen at the time in the blocks around 11th Street, where Levchuk said he often saw ducks.

Levchuk said councilors tend to congregate around food service businesses, where their chances of finding a snack are high. As he said, there doesn’t seem to be any pressure for many blocks where there are more shops than food businesses.

After the meeting, Levchuk said that gulls were a big problem before the reduction program, explaining that they are less of a problem now. Levchuk suggested that things could have gotten worse if the program hadn’t been implemented.

When the first contract was signed, Gillian discussed it in terms of public safety, saying the seagulls were becoming more aggressive in their foraging on the Boardwalk and on the beach. have hurt someone else.

Levchuk said he doesn’t want the whites to suffer, he just wants them to be somewhere else.

“That’s why I liked the show. It was not meant to harm them. “It was just to push them away and let the sea ducks learn to go back to nature, instead of eating everyone’s popcorn, french fries and pizza,” Levchuk said.