Night fell over Birmingham in a blaze of street lamps and floodlights. Eleven floors up, I drew the heavy curtains against the glare, and fell asleep. It didn’t feel like long, before I was being eased awake by the morning birds. Not your average dawn chorus – all I could hear were seagulls. I opened the window and their kookaburra-like laughter filled the room. There they were, soaring over the skyline on slightly tattered wings like raggedy angels.

There were two breeds, herring gulls and lesser black-backed gulls.