Blackheaded Seagull - Industrial habitat

Chroicocephalus ridibundus Industrius

Over here you're mute. I see you wheeling over us, watching us as we pack and unpack, shift boxes, lift crates, reverse lorries, lay out more track, concrete, asphalt.

I see you watch, see you turn your head to get a better view: bottles and cartons, plastic bags blown up like something bloated, something dead.

You home in then. Scavenge. That's what you do. An avian fungus feeding on what remains. The end of a chain. A scrap merchant in a black mask.

Once I saw you in your proper place having a party. There were lots of you. You called out, plunged down into the sea, played games. There was a kind of joy in how you flew.

But here it's serious. Here is where the rot sets in and you're monitoring it like an official. It's spreading, you say, being washed up on beaches everywhere.

Too much, you cry, enough. And someone looks up, wonders at seeing you this far inland and why, suddenly, you're calling.

(Written this morning in response to Chester Grosvenor's Museum call for creative works describing wildlife in their Cheshire Habitat)