Hotels in Venice have been providing guests with water pistols in a bid to tackle aggressive seagulls.
The Venice hoteliers association has had enough of gulls stealing food from guests dining outdoors.
They examined a number of options including hiring a falconer to hunt the gulls, or deterring them with a special acoustic system or unpleasant odours which can't be perceived by humans.
After trying a falconer but realising it was too expensive, they settled on orange water pistols - as seagulls don't like the colour, so guests rarely have to use them and simply keeping them on the table is proving effective.
