The Great Pacific Garbage Patch or Synthetic Sea are areas of the Pacific Ocean where trash is carried and concentrated by ocean currents into a soup. Since this human waste is having adverse impacts on marine ecosystems and on marine life, the area has become a concern for conservationists and environmentalists.
To keep oceans clean and to keep wildlife from ingesting our trash, it is important that we either recycle unwanted materials or place them into a trash receptacle. Albatrosses will feed plastic — mistaken for marine food— to their chicks, and the chicks die slowly from a diet of indigestible trash.
Other marine life suffers from anthropogenic waste too. Sea turtles can die from ingesting plastic, because the plastic impacts within their gut. Marine debris also impacts other marine life such as fish.
Do you need proof that trash such as plastic adversely impacts marine wildlife? The images below show decomposed albatross chicks that have died from consuming marine debris. Obviously, the indigestible trash must result in a painful and slow death. More information can be found here and here.
On the Net:
- Marine Debris: Cigarette Lighters and the Plastic Problem on Midway Atoll
- Remote Waters Offer No Refuge from Plastic Trash
- Oprah Shines Light On Great Pacific Garbage Patch (VIDEO)
UPDATE 1 (24 April 09):
Video: Small fish living within the synthetic sea are consuming plastic:
Synthetic sea images were found here. Albatross images were found here, here, here, and here.
