Speedy Animal Control, San Diego CA

Gulls and their guano are a filthy menace | Letters

Richard Ellis says cleaning up is costly and more suitable habitats for the birds should be restored

The decline in gull numbers must be a cause for concern. However, having once lived in a much gull-colonised town, I’d like to advance an alternative view to Sophie Pavelle’s (Trying to get rid of noisy, food-stealing gulls is missing the point – it’s humans who are the pests, 8 June).

Urban gulls excrete guano copiously. It covers cars, buildings and streets in a steady, noxious rain. As a corrosive substance it damages paintwork on buildings and paint on cars, guttering and ironwork, such as railings. As a fertiliser it boosts the growth of weeds on roofs and pavements, blocking drainage systems.

The secret psychology of dogs and cats: do we ever really know what they are thinking?

Pets have long been a source of comfort and companionship for humans. But are they really trying to console us when we’re distressed or do they just want their dinner?

I am lost in Morris’s eyes. They are brown, almond-shaped and fringed by impossibly long lashes. He looks back at me, softly blinking occasionally, and then reaches out his tongue and licks my cheek, just once.

I’ve been depressed lately, and while I’ve received compassion and support from many dear people, Morris, my 10-year-old terrier, has been one of the greatest sources of comfort. With that reassuring lick, that steady gaze, he’s conveying a message: “It’s OK. Everything will be all right.”

Posters, scented items and drones: Highland hunt for teenager’s missing therapy dog

After retriever Louie got spooked on a walk his owners have not stopped searching for him – and local walkers have stepped in too

Walking along Nevis Gorge, the rumble of Steall Falls can be heard long before you see it. Rocky terrain clears to expansive grassland, forest and shrubbery.

Among Glen Nevis’s lush greenery, flashes of bright red paper can be seen. It is not litter left by tourists who have trekked to this beauty spot, but missing posters handed out by the family of Louie, a two-year-old golden retriever who has been missing for a fortnight.

Shark nearly bites off nine-year-old girl’s hand in attack off Florida coast

Leah Lendel was snorkeling with her mother and younger siblings when the animal bit her

A 9-year-old girl nearly lost her hand after a shark attacked her while she swam just off the coast of Florida recently, according to her family and witnesses.

The harrowing attack served up a grim reminder that the Sunshine state is a world leader in unprovoked shark bites against humans – though such cases remain rare and were evidently waning as of late.

Devon farm footage prompts calls to ban restrictive pens for pregnant pigs

Welfare of sows confined to farrowing crates was compromised and they displayed signs of extreme stress, experts say

The use of restrictive pens to temporarily house pregnant pigs in the UK severely compromises their welfare, can traumatise them and should be banned, experts have said.

Analysis by Animal Equality UK of footage collected from a farm in Devon showed that three pregnant sows in farrowing crates spent more than 90% of their time lying down, with one not standing up at all for a day. On average, between them they bit the bars (a sign of extreme stress) more than once an hour.

Attenborough’s Ocean is the film I’ve been waiting my whole career for – now the world must act on its message | George Monbiot

The documentary shows the damage that fishing does to our planet. So why does the industry still hold governments to ransom?

I have been saying this a lot recently: “At last!” At last, a mainstream film bluntly revealing the plunder of our seas. At last, a proposed ban on bottom trawling in so-called “marine protected areas” (MPAs). At last, some solid research on seabed carbon and the vast releases caused by the trawlers ploughing it up. But still I feel that almost everyone is missing the point.

David Attenborough’s Ocean film, made for National Geographic, is the one I’ve been waiting for all my working life. An epoch ago, when I worked in the BBC’s Natural History Unit in the mid-1980s, some of us lobbied repeatedly for films like this, without success. Since then, even programmes that purport to discuss marine destruction have carefully avoided the principal cause: the fishing industry. The BBC’s Blue Planet II and Blue Planet Live series exemplified the organisation’s perennial failure of courage.

George Monbiot is a Guardian columnist