The first series of posts is about PLASTIC POLLUTION. Plastic pollution is not something new to us. In fact, it has become one of the most pressing issues that we face today. Let me start off by giving a brief overview about plastic pollution. Plastic can mainly be categorized into macroplastics and microplastics. As the names…

In the previous post, I introduced macroplastics and microplastics. For today, let us focus on  its effects on animals. Some effects of plastics, especially that of macroplastics, are quite straightforward. These effects are easily observable with the naked eye. (1) Entanglement Macroplastics such as fishing gear, fishing nets, etc are often the cause of entanglements….

In the previous post, we explored the obvious effects of plastic pollution on animals. However, the effects are not the same for microplastics. The effects seem to produce chemical/biological effects on animals. According to Prokić et al. (2019), microplastics can result in “oxidative damage”, modify “antioxidative system and metabolism” and “neurotoxic” impacts. These effects have…

Now that we are aware of the complexities of the effects of plastics, what animals specifically are affected by plastic pollution? Well, hundreds of species of animals are affected by plastic pollution. But there are a number of species that are greatly affected than the rest. The short video below by CNN introduces plastic pollution…

According to National Geographic, a shocking 90% of seabirds are ingesting plastic as of 2015 (National Geographic, 2015) If that doesn’t tell you how severe the plastic pollution problem is in seabirds, I don’t know what will. With increasing plastic pollution and increasing number of plastics in oceans, it is highly likely that the proportion…

In the previous post, I had mentioned that the journal articles did not investigate if normal diets, other than plastic ingestion, contributed to chemical additives to be leached into seabirds. But, I actually came across this article that I thought was worth mentioning with regards to bioaccumulation of such chemicals from their natural diet. This…

For today’s post, we will be finding out about the extent of plastic pollution in seabirds. As the name suggests, seabirds can be defined as birds that mostly live at sea. Some common types of seabirds include Albatross, Fulmars and Shearwater (The Spruce, 2020). Are all types of seabirds affected equally? Or are there certain species that…

Hello guys! If you’re here, I assume that you read the previous article as well. Now, let’s get back to where we ended off in the last post. Are the findings, regarding foraging depths and level of plastic ingestion, from the journal article we explored previously generalizable? Lets take a look at another journal article….

Let me start off by showing you some news headlines about whales.     Around the world, whales have been dying and getting washed ashore. Some whales die because of entanglement due to macroplastics like fishing nets and ropes. What’s more shocking is the increasing trend of  whales being washed ashore with huge amounts of…

According to National Geographic (2019), only certain species of whales , specifically deep-diving toothed whales, seem to have a higher tendency to be washed ashore onto beaches filled with plastics. The ingestion of plastics is narrowed down to biological features of whales where Baleen whales (eg: humpbacks and blue whales) have natural filters instead of…