Working meeting of the association with local bodies on the ‘seagull problem’ at the beginning of February
As indicated several times by the Associazione Piazza San Marco, after the pigeon problem in St Mark’s Square, that of the seagulls continues to persist. Some time ago our association asked the Venice provincial administration for advice on this specific phenomenon of numerous and aggressive seagulls in the St Mark’s area. The provincial administration wrote in a letter that the phenomenon was due to the increase in the species in its central Mediterranean distributional area and the easy availability of food sources in Venice’s city centre. It specified that some initial activities could be localised in the St Mark’s area with actions aimed at reducing the food sources and directly intervening on the nesting sites. The provincial administration is prepared to hold specific meetings with other bodies to synergically draw up a strategy for medium-long term action. After a meeting with the city council’s environmental office on 19 January 2015, the association managed to gain agreement to a new joint meeting, also with the provincial administration, on 4 February 2015 in the hope of launching a united strategy to deal with the problem.