Seabird Plastic Ingestion Welfare

Plastic ingestion in seabirds causes starvation, physical injury, toxic contamination, and death, with almost all seabird species now affected globally.

Key Facts

Over 90% of seabirds sampled globally have plastic in their digestive systems
Albatross parents feed plastic fragments to chicks believing them to be food, causing malnutrition and gut impaction
Microplastic ingestion causes chemical toxicity through persistent organic pollutants absorbed onto plastic surfaces
The volume of plastic ingested correlates with the proportion of plastic in the ocean, expected to increase significantly

Welfare Considerations

Seabird plastic welfare is a crisis operating at planetary scale. Individual birds suffer physical gut damage from sharp plastic fragments, false satiation as plastic occupies stomach space, and chemical toxicity from plastic-associated pollutants. Chicks die before fledging with stomachs full of indigestible plastic fragments. The suffering is invisible to most humans but is documented at significant scale by seabird researchers. Solutions require upstream plastic production and waste management reform as well as ocean clean-up, making this primarily a policy and consumer behaviour challenge.

What You Can Do

Support plastic pollution reduction legislation including producer responsibility schemes
Participate in coastal and ocean clean-up activities
Choose plastic-free or minimal packaging alternatives where available
Support organisations working on both plastic pollution and seabird welfare research