Ocean Plastic Smells Like Food to Sea Turtles
In a recent study, it was discovered that Sea Turtles are attracted to plastic not just because they may look like food, but because the plastic smells like food. In the experiment turtles had kept their up three times longer for the biofouled plastics, then for the control plastics and ionized water. The turtles cared more about plastic. This is not good because now we know that Sea Turtles may be seeking out plastic for food because they like the smell. It was already known that the plastic issue was bad, but now we know that animals can be seeking out for it, which leads to their death faster.
This is really scary to know because there is so much plastic in our oceans and if we continue to treat the planet poorly, more and more animals are going to be affected.
I believe this is not a healthy thing for the Sea Turtles and something needs to be done to stop all the plastic from getting in the oceans. There are organizations on the East and West coast that collect the trash on the beach so it won't end up in the water where it can harm sea life. We should support these organizations if we want them to continue to eliminate the pollution on the beach and in the water. Not only is properly disposing of plastic important to our environment but it is also important to Sea Turtles and other sea life.
ReplyDeleteCould a possible solution to this be engineering a plastic with a smell that wouldn't be confused for food, or a smell that deters organisms that could mistake it for food? I have no idea if something like this would even work, yet alone be cost effective enough that large corporations would adopt it, but if we could see it implemented cheaply, it could save millions of lives in the ocean.
ReplyDeleteWith this discovery, it makes the plastic in the ocean seem way more deadly than it was before. The sea turtles being attracted to plastic because it smells like food, does not just impact their population but the whole food chain. This can cause other animals to turn towards plastic as their food source. It would be in best interest to research ways to stop the smell of plastic that causes the sea turtles to believe it is food. Also focusing on minimizing plastic waste or volunteering to stop the plastic heading into the ocean.
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