Pollution of our seas is arguably the biggest threat to marine life around the planet.
A major source of marine pollution comes in the form of plastic garbage, much of which converges in the Great Pacific Garbage Patch that I mentioned in my last column.
Wherever it occurs in the ocean, plastic is a major hazard to marine life. Plastic may lead to animal mortality from the outside, through entangling or suffocating an animal. Plastic may also threaten an animal from the inside by building up in an animal’s stomach as the animal mistakes plastic for food.