--- title: Gulls: chip thieves, rain dances and salty water — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «Gulls: chip thieves, rain dances and salty water», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Anyone who has eaten chips on a seaside promenade knows the gull that swoops down and snatches one right out of a child's --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / Gulls: chip thieves, rain dances and s… # Gulls: chip thieves, rain dances and salty water Lesson 223 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 16 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/0/) — Anyone who has eaten chips on a seaside promenade knows the gull that swoops down and snatches one right out of a child's hand: gulls are bold and clever, and they have learned that people carry food. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/1/) — On a park lawn a gull may stamp its feet up and down like a little dance; the drumming feels like rain to the worms, they come up, and the gull eats them. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/2/) — Gulls can drink sea water, because glands above their eyes take the salt out of their blood, and the salty water drips out of their nose. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/3/) — There is no single bird called a seagull: there are many kinds of gull, like the herring gull and the black-headed gull, and many of them live far inland, around rubbish tips, fields and city roofs. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/4/) — A brown speckled gull is not a different bird but a young one, and a big herring gull takes about four years to get its grown-up grey and white feathers. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/5/) — Gulls are bold and clever, and they learn that people carry food, so some snatch chips and sandwiches at the seaside. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/6/) — A gull stamps its feet on grass to imitate rain, which makes worms come up to the surface where the gull can catch them. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/7/) — Gulls can drink salt water, because glands above their eyes remove the salt and it drips out of their nose. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/8/) — Many gulls have moved into towns and nest on flat rooftops, because cities have food and safe roofs away from foxes. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/10/) — Seagull is just a nickname; there are many kinds of gull, such as herring gulls and black-headed gulls, and many live inland. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/11/) — A gull drops a shellfish onto rocks from a height to smash the shell open. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/12/) — Gulls follow a tractor ploughing a field, because ploughing turns up worms and grubs. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/13/) — Young gulls are brown and speckled; a herring gull takes about four years to look fully grown up. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/14/) — Herring gulls seem to be everywhere in towns, but in the wild their numbers have fallen, and in Britain they are a protected species. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/15/) — Gulls have many calls; the loud long call with the head thrown back claims a territory. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/223-gulls-chip-thieves-rain-dances-and-salty-water/16/) — A gull has two legs, two wings and webbed feet for swimming. - ← previous: [Rats and mice in the city, and the elephant and mouse myth](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/222-rats-and-mice-in-the-city-and-the-elephant-and-mouse-myth/) - next →: [Raccoons, opossums and skunks](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/224-raccoons-opossums-and-skunks/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)