The fact that J Neil Young (Letters, April 10) cannot find sources for the "thousands" of marine birds and mammals that die annually from plastic ingestion reflects more on his inability to surf the internet properly than the reality of the situation. Plastic bags and nylon rope are not the only pollutants in the sea.
The facts are that not thousands but hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of seabirds, marine mammals and reptiles the world over die from plastic ingestion and contamination from oceanic pollution. Even the most remote areas of Antarctica and the creatures that live there are now internally contaminated.
I commented first on plastics ingested by seabirds in 1985 in British Birds (Vol 78). Seabirds such as fulmars, storm petrels and shearwaters in particular ingest these floating particles in mistake for food.
The polyethylene resin "beads" they swallow are the feedstock of the plastics industry and are the most insidious, getting into the sea via factory (cracker-plant) outfalls and the bursting of bags on wharfsides when being exported and imported.
Scotland, along with Japan, is among the worst of these culprits, and 98% of Scottish fulmars examined, from a population of more than one million birds, contain plastic marine debris that was directly or indirectly the cause of their demise.
The plastics factories appear to get off scot-free from prosecution, despite having polluted almost every Scottish beach and beyond.
It is one very good reason why legislation on marine nature reserves is long overdue. Perhaps then the polluters will be called to account. Sadly, no political party has taken up the cause.
Mr Young should look up work by Dutch ornithologist Jan van Franeker or check New Scientist 2005 titles such as "Seabirds ingest bellyfuls of plastic pollution" and publications such as those by the Marine Conservation Society, the Marine Pollution Bulletin or Marine Ornithology.
The RSPCA barely knows the problem exists. Mr Young and other readers can also go directly to the US Environmental Protection Agency website for further reference data: www.mindfully.org/Plastic/Ocean/ Plastic-Aquatic-EPA842B92010-Dec92_7.htm or www.epa.gov/owow/oceans/debris/ plasticpellets/index.html.
There is a plethora of publication on the subject covering 30 years.
Dr Bernard Zonfrillo, Ornithology Unit, Division of Environmental & Evolutionary Biology, Glasgow University.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article