A horde of seagulls following a plough (no surprise there), & a smaller, but still substantial (they wouldn't stay still to be counted, but maybe 20) flock of kites, near Ipsden, South Oxfordshire, this afternoon. Tried to get pictures, but didn't get a decent one. The ploughman stopped for a chat, & told me they routinely followed the plough now, & wherever he went, he was sure to soon have a flock behind him. He said (& after he moved on, I confirmed it by observation) that the gulls (& he also said rooks, but there were none present on this occasion) kept out of the way of the kites, although he was confident that kites posed no threat to them. He thought perhaps they didn't distinguish between kites & more dangerous birds of prey.
I'd thought of the plough turning up worms, but he said as well as worms & other invertebrates, it turned up mice, voles & the like.
He reckoned that the crowds following him were one symptom (he though there were others) that there were too many kites in the locality for the available natural food (i.e. carrion), & agreed that people feeding them was probably a contributory factor, encouraging them to stay in the area when they should be dispersing to as yet uncolonised territory. He said that some of them were pretty tame - "not as they should be", in his words, & would approach very close to anyone with food, which he disapproved of, thinking wild creatures should remain wild.
A thoughtful ploughman.
