They were noisy, they left a lot of mess, no one knew why they arrived and then why they left again.
This was the astonishing scene at a roundabout in Yate, near Bristol, last night, when hundreds of seagulls came from apparently all over South Gloucestershire and landed on a roundabout.
Witness Stacie Orban was travelling in a car when she stopped to film the scene before her.
The scene unfolded as she travelled towards the end of Armstrong Way, through the Oaklands Business Park, at around 12.15am.
And there, on the roundabout junction where Iron Acton Way meets Yate Road on the north western edge of Yate, was a scene reminiscent of Alfred Hitchcock’s The Birds.
“I think the seagulls in Yate decided to have a late night meeting,” said Ms Orban.
“I’ve never seen so many at once. They were flying to that one spot from all directions, and just flying around there for a while, and then all just randomly flew off at the same time, it was pretty crazy,” she added.
Mystery surrounds why the seagulls behaved like this at that time.
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The area around the roundabout contains a food production company, a nursery school and a farm, but the seagulls appeared to be honing in on a particular spot on the roundabout itself, leading some to fear they were gathering at the site of a recent piece of roadkill.
Whatever it was, the reason for the gathering is unknown, and they took off within a few minutes of arriving - but whereas they all arrived from different directions, they left heading in the same direction - towards Yate town centre.
