Marine plastic pollution harms seabirds through ingestion, entanglement, and chick feeding, with welfare consequences ranging from gastric obstruction to starvation.
Marine plastic debris causes a cascade of welfare harms to seabirds that range from immediate physical injury to slow starvation across months. The most poignant welfare impact is in species like Laysan albatross, where parents inadvertently feed chicks bottle caps, fishing lures, and lighter cases mistaken for squid. Chicks die with stomachs full of plastic and empty of nutrition. For adult birds, plastic ingestion reduces food intake and causes gastric injury and obstruction. Entanglement in fishing lines and ghost nets causes drowning of otherwise healthy individuals. Each seabird death from plastic pollution is a preventable welfare harm caused directly by human waste production. Reducing plastic at source - through production restrictions and improved waste systems - is the only solution that addresses the problem at its root.