News and comment – September 2023

News and comment – September 2023

Plastics threat to seabirds

A BirdLife-led research team has assessed the movements of 7,137 birds of 77 tubenose species, comparing the birds’ distributions with maps of plastic prevalence in the world’s oceans (https://bit.ly/3KyPOMf). The species looked at in the study included shearwaters, fulmars, prions and Pterodoma petrels. The team found that a number of threatened species faced a high risk of exposure to plastic.

The data have revealed that areas of the Mediterranean and Black Sea pose a particularly high risk to seabirds, together accounting for more than half of plastic exposure risk. Other high-risk areas include remote areas of the high seas and waters surrounding the USA, Japan and Britain.

Already a subscriber? Log in here

< Previous articleNext article >