Sod's law

Would you believe it? After I had my little rant about seagulls the other day (see My Pet Hates blog), I decided I had to do something about the chick that had made our back garden its home for a week - and secreted its toxic innards all over our slabs - so I went on to Amazon and ordered a couple of cheap bird scarers to see if that would work.

The scarers arrived yesterday (Friday), coinciding neatly with the disappearance of our little fledgling! I guess it finally found its wings.

Now the task is to clean up the back. The pressure hose loosened some of it, but much of it is so ingrained, it's going to take some chemicals and scrubbing to remove all the unsightly marks the gull left behind.

As a precaution against future raids, I did still hang the scarers out:

Back garden

Balcony at front

Let's see if they work. Having had many years of experience with seagulls at work in Fraserburgh, I realise they're not so dumb. Whilst real birds - hawks and owls - scare them away for a while, they soon suss things out and realise when a threat is real or not, then just revert to their normal pattern.

To other matters. Tomorrow (Sunday), Gary, Carole and Luca are coming over for Gary's slightly belated birthday dinner, then on Monday, Dawn is coming to stay with us - I hope the weather stays fair - it was beautiful yesterday and it's a cracking start to Saturday.