How to deal with bloody gulls?!

[Seagullhell]

Posting in AIBU shamelessly for traffic, sorry, but getting rather desperate for some help!

We moved to our new house earlier this year. Our bedroom is in the extension with a flat roof, upon which, we quickly found out, are nesting seagulls. And OMG, the NOISE 😭

It annoys me a fair amount, but I'm generally capable of going back to sleep after being woken. But it's starting to make my DH ill. He's always been a light sleeper, so when they start up at 4/5am stomping around (it actually sounds like they're dropping rocks), he can't get back to sleep. He works in a high pressure job and has a long commute half the week. It's reached the point where he's called in sick - in nearly 20 years I've known him to do this once, maybe twice.

Since this all started we've discovered he has a B12 deficiency, and he's waiting for an appointment to delve into and hopes to get injections prescribed which we hope will help with the lightness of his sleep generally. But what else can we do?!

He tried sleeping on the sofa - can't sleep. The other rooms are occupied or face a busy main road. He's tried earplugs, but can't sleep in them. He's taking B12 tablets until his docs appointment along with magnesium to help, but they don't seem to do anything.

We've got to the point where we can't help but wonder about just kicking the bloody nest off the roof. We know this is illegal, so we won't, but it's hard watching him reach breaking point and not feeling a bit murderous.

We need tips to get him through the summer where the babies will have flown the nest and we can engage professionals to do something to hopefully prevent them from coming back.

Can anyone suggest any other supplements, aids, remedies etc to help him get better quality sleep until that point?

(Also any suggestions about things that will actually work to get rid of the bastard gulls highly appreciated too!)

We have many gulls on our roof, I’ve grown to love them! We have our windows open a lot and they have started mimicking the sounds they hear from our house (cats and baby!)

They are indeed very noisy, but this is their home as well as ours. Besides, it’s illegal to ‘do’ anything about them. I sympathise with your DH’s health issues, but he is being a little bit precious about the ear plugs.

I live a near the coast, and a garden centre that is very close to the sea has one of those fake hawks. It's on a big flexible metal pole so it looks like it's swooping around.

It seems to work a treat, I've never had my car covered in seagull shite there. (This is quite a regular event at the nearby Sainsburys.)

All wildlife. The clue is in the title "wild". People feeding wildlife are being cruel rather than kind.
Cruel and stupid.

Yes, I grew up by the sea. Always loved seagulls.

Foxes are not my concern as they don't scream into the night and combine harvesters are doing a job. I grew up on a farm.

Gulls are a completely different problem. There are too many. It's ridiculous how many there are. I live far away from the coast but they are here constantly crying 24/7. They don't let up even for a minute ! I live 50 miles from the coast. They wake me up all through the night! I don't think I am being unreasonable in asking for a cull

I have noticed when I have spent time in Spain and Italy, on the coast, that this doesn't to be seem a problem. Have noticed gulls but theyre way up above.

Get a b12 injection privately

I don’t know if gulls by the sea are seen as cuter than the ones near us, but in our entirely non-coastal city, they are an absolute menace. They squawk from the early hours every day, they shove their chicks out of the nest when they’re too young to fly and then spend the next few weeks dive-bombing anyone who happens to walk past. They scavenge and spread litter all over the place. They’ll grab food out of people”s hands. Plus they’re fucking huge!

My friend lives on the coast and has grown used to the noise of the gulls, it has become background noise. Except this year when they were really banging and clattering on the roof.

They had a builder go up and check the chimney ( repointing) and he found a half a coconut shell they had taken up onto the roof and were using as a football! 🥥

Normal squawking resumed after it was removed.

Says everything about the sort of person you are

More than possible.

I had a cherry tree out front. A bit diseased so had to chop down. They used to strip that.

So then they moved round to the plum tree at the back. This year I spent 2 months chasing them off every time they tried to land. They got the message eventually.

Now its plum-arama.

Edit : I feel a bit sorry for them now because they look a bit thin.

They look evil with a really beady eye.

I’d be scaring that little fucker away if it came in my garden.

No it doesn't
Have you actually lived beside them?

At Glastonbury this year my caravan was right in the middle of the festival and it was so noisy at night you wouldn’t believe. A friend gave me some ear plugs made from wax that you mould to your ears and they completely blocked out all sound, there was total silence, so much better than other types of ear plugs I’ve used.

I live in Sheffield.

Theyve been playing havoc on the local secondary school for 20 years.

Haven't tried anything that cuts through gull noise unfortunately. Will try that though thanks.

The ignorance is woeful.

I suspect conservationists who live in a bubble absolutely away from anyway near any flock of gulls. Probably a moor somewhere.

Perhaps talk to your council. Culling won’t happen though

for most of us as a pp noted It’s just background noise we all become used to

It is true- under the Wildlife and Countryside 1981 it’s illegal to disturb nesting and breeding wild birds. Herring gulls are UK red listed and Lesser black backs are amber listed.

I’ve not read every post so apologies if already mentioned but b12 is far better absorbed intraorally, ie a spray for the inside of the check rather than digested.

You have actually become background gull screeching at 2:30 and then every hour until whatever. I find that hard to imagine?

Sorry
Edit . You have become used to gull screeching at 02:30 [onwards when you are trying to sleep and have to go to work in the morning

No, it's not just a background noise.
Have you checked the actual decibels from a gull? It's way over. And it's not background noise..it's far beyond that.

Yes. But no matter how many times I or anyone says that, or points out that their numbers are in decline, you’re just going to keep repeating your fixed belief that it’s not so.

Whatever species of tree we have in the front garden the pigeons have the berries. They have to share with the magpies and the normal garden birds but they get in there. They weigh the branches down so it's quite amusing for us

We also have bird feeders and the pigeons pick the bits the other birds drop so I think they should be doing okay