Good Parking Spaces

Why do Sea Gulls fly around parking lots?

I live in the Midwest and there isn't an ocean near me. But when I am in big, open, outside parking lots, there seems to be a bunch of sea gulls flying around. How do they get there and why do they stick around? Do they think the reflection from the cars looks like the ocean or something? I know they are looking for food, but how did they get there in the first place if I'm no where near a major body of water?

Public Comments

1. Target practice
2. For free food, home slice.
3. looking for food
4. No, they are looking for food that people discard in the lot.
5. they look for scraps and food people give them or throw away.
6. maybe they are migrating
7. empty spaces make it easier to spot food.
8. there scavenges there looking for food
9. Water: Kitchen Cars: Toilet
10. i dont know
11. they fly near people hoping to get something to eat. scraps of food, or trash they can eat.
12. People throw food and stuff in them.
13. It's a definate easy source of food for them. You will also see them at fast food resteraunts, etc.
14. They are there for the food. Just like fat relatives at a wedding. People use parking lots as trash cans, and the birds learn quick that food is plentiful. Some birds learn to raid the cans themselves. Next time someone calls you bird brain, say Thanks.
15. Trash they are looking for food . they hang around dump sites too. also if the parking lot is flat at a higher level then surrounding area thay like to congregate in places like that.
16. more food here than by seaside...Canadian geese dont leave anymore either
17. Seagulls are built for long-distance flying. And they're very savvy scavengers. They know that humans tend to drop food in parking lots.
18. There Looking For Cars To Steal....
19. Birds are often carried to different locations by the winds of storms. Some just start flying in a direction with several others and eat as they travel along and don't ever return to where they came from. Thousands of them travel between landfills all the time. Gulls are just opportunists and are always looking for a scrap to eat then they also like to bomb people so never look up at a gull...you might just take some incoming!
20. Nope, it's the food, they go where the scraps are, they are real scavengers when they aren't hunting fish. They are related to, Pigions. I know, I'm a semi Floridian. Not, born here, but may as well have been.. Loll..
21. looking for a good parking space ?
22. count yourself lucky!! We live by the sea and the seagulls here have tattoos and carry flick knives!!
23. FOOD
24. They may have been fed by other people so they hang around to see if others will feed them. You will even find a lot of Gulls in garbage dumps looking for scraps, they eat almost anything they can find. Sapphyre Certified Avian Specialist http://www.borrowed-rainbow.com join our group http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BorrowedRainbowAviary/
25. They fly there! They stick around because people have a habit of throwing bits of food out for them! Gulls are greedy birds by nature and will eat almost anything on offer! Food is the answer.
26. lookin for food
27. They cant afford the parking fees Also there are a lot of seagulls that have migrated in land to dumps where they scavenge. If the lot has the right wind currents around it so that the seagulls can rride the currents without expending energy they will hang around waiting for feeding opportunities.