Gulf News readers Hemant N. S. and Abdul Kareem picked up their lens and went out to capture the graceful seagulls in the UAE. Hemant said: “I was at the Dubai Creek Park one evening when I spotted a flock of seagulls. Their graceful flight was a soothing sight.”
Seagulls are the migrating wild birds that come to the UAE shores every winter from Siberia and Mediterranean regions.
Coming from the chilly frozen regions they live by the warmer waters of the Arabian Gulf and end up attracting scores of residents and visitors. Avi Bhandari, who lives by the Dubai Creek said: “After the scorching summer most UAE resident look forward to winter so that they can go barbeque in the numerous parks and plan over night trips to the desert. Even my family engages in similar activities but for me the most exciting part about winter is to wake up in the morning and look out of my window to find the beautiful seagulls.”
Sharjah resident, Abdul Kareem, picked up his lens and went for a walk to Buhairah Corniche once he spotted the seagulls. He said: “They are simply beautiful. Their flight over the waters in search of food is so elegant that no photographer would be able to resist capturing them. It’s mesmerising.”
According to UAE Interact, a website supported by the UAE National Media Council, there are 140 types of migrating birds that have been accounted for in the UAE, but the number has dwindled.
Chairman of Adco Astronomy Club and member of Abu Dhabi Astronomy Heritage Club Mohammad Thayib Assalami, who is also an avid bird watcher, told UAE Interact the major reasons behind this decline. He said ‘the drifting massive ice blocks in the North Pole that change the earth’s magnetic field can be one of the reasons’, as some birds fly by the earth’s magnetic field.
He added: “There are other regional issues such as efforts of countries to check the spread of bird flu which are transmitted by the migratory birds. Some countries have taken drastic measures to check the migration.”
