Sainsbury’s has vowed to take action against aggressive Aberdeen seagulls stealing food from shaken shoppers.
The situation has escalated to the point where visitors to the Berryden supermarket are being warned against unpacking their bags outside the store.
One woman showed us her punctured packet of mince, swooped upon while she was putting her shopping in the boot.
And another told us how her toddler had been “pecked on the head” before his sandwich was swiped.
When we visited the car park, the seagulls were circling like vultures at an elephant graveyard.
Terror on the tarmac
During their lunch breaks, the supermarket staff watch as the birds hover over helpless shoppers before hurtling beak-first at any food not sufficiently hidden in their trolleys or – worse – already opened.
Jennifer Feroz was pushing two toddlers across the car park in a twin pushchair when a flock gathered overhead. Her grandson had opened the cheese and ham sandwich she’d bought him for lunch.
Then, without warning, the gulls struck.
Jennifer said: “He had his sandwich in his hand, I’d just given him it, and a load of them just came and pecked him in the head then stole his sandwich.”
The sandwich was dropped on the ground just in front of the shocked group, and torn to pieces by the attackers.
“I should realise that they’re here, but I just never thought,” she said.
“I was just saying to him, don’t throw your crusts because that would attract them, and… he didn’t even get one bite!”
Just a few minutes later, closer to the shop, Kate Frisken was dive-bombed before she could begin packing her hatchback.
She said: “I stopped my trolley, went to get my keys, and a seagull just came right down and stuck its beak in my mince.”
As she spoke to us, the same gull that had attacked her continued to swagger around nearby, as if waiting for her to drop her guard so it could properly claim its prize.
Shaken, Kate took her punctured packet of ground beef back inside the shop to see if they would swap it out for a new one.
Jennifer and Kate’s experiences are not isolated.
Anecdotes from the check-out tell of chicken packets being pulled from trolleys and torn open on the tarmac, with cuts of poultry being wolfed down in one by feathered fiends.
And earlier in the year, one of them was filmed eating a full package of raw bacon nicked from a terrified shopper.
With the cost of living crisis sending the prices of some products higher than they have been in decades, a ruined item of food can be much more than a simple annoyance to shoppers.
Watching their hard-earned cash vanish down the gullet of a gull has made some people reluctant to return to the shop for fear of a repeat offence.
The issue is so pervasive and so well-known by staff, they regularly warn customers not to unpack their shopping at their car.
And workers have often agreed to replace items that have been damaged by the birds free of charge, while the supermarket investigates ways of tackling the behaviour for good.
A Sainsbury’s spokeswoman told us the firm is now working on options for encouraging the gulls to relocate away from the car park.
She said: “We are aware of the disruption these unwelcome guests are causing at Berryden Retail Park and we are looking at measures we can introduce to deter them.”
Conversation