Wild Seabird Welfare: Bycatch, Pollution, and Climate Change

Seabirds face multiple anthropogenic welfare threats including fisheries bycatch, plastic pollution, and climate-driven prey shifts. Each represents an opportunity for human action to reduce avoidable suffering.

Key Facts

An estimated 400,000 seabirds are killed as bycatch annually in longline fisheries
Plastic ingestion causes organ damage, starvation, and death in seabirds worldwide
Climate change is shifting fish distributions causing prey mismatches during breeding seasons
Seabird populations have declined by 70% globally since 1950
Simple mitigation measures including line weighting and night setting dramatically reduce bycatch

Welfare Considerations

Seabirds experience diverse welfare impacts from human activities. Bycatch causes drowning in birds that become entangled in fishing gear. Plastic ingestion causes blockages, organ perforation, and toxic chemical exposure that cause suffering and death. Oil spills cause hypothermia from coat damage, toxic ingestion during preening, and blindness. Climate-driven prey shifts mean breeding seabirds may fail to find adequate food during the critical chick-rearing period, causing prolonged starvation of both adults and chicks. Marine protected areas, fishery management, plastic reduction, and climate mitigation all contribute to improving seabird welfare.

What You Can Do

Choose seafood from fisheries certified to bycatch reduction standards
Reduce single-use plastic use and participate in coastal clean-up events
Support marine protected areas that provide refuge for seabird foraging
Donate to seabird conservation organizations and rehabilitation centers
Take climate action to address the prey availability impacts on breeding seabirds
Report oiled or injured seabirds to appropriate wildlife rescue organizations