Albatrosses face compounding threats from plastic pollution, longline bycatch, and invasive species at nesting colonies, with each threat causing distinctive and severe individual welfare harms.
Albatross chicks dying from plastic ingestion experience prolonged starvation as their stomachs fill with indigestible material while parents make thousands of kilometers of foraging journeys to feed them. Each plastic fragment fed to a chick represents a failure point in a food delivery system that requires enormous parental investment. Adult albatrosses drowning in longline gear die struggling underwater while hooked. The combination of these welfare harms across an entire order of seabirds represents one of the most visible and preventable wildlife welfare catastrophes associated with human waste and fishing practices.