Marine Debris

I was sitting in the airport in San Francisco eagerly awaiting my plane to begin my journey back to Midway Atoll when I overheard a conversation. A woman was running back to her family waving a package in the air... "Look what I just found! Aren't they cool? It's a whole package of disposable toothbrushes! You use them once and throw them away!" I could feel my gut twinge as I listened to them 'oooo' and 'ahhhh' over the brightly colored plastic brushes... 6 to a pack.

All I could think of were the bodies of the albatross chicks I saw in November from last season and how every single one I looked at had a bolus of plastic in it's stomach when I looked. Mono filament fishing line, lighters, toothbrushes, combs, hairbrushes, fishing floats, children's toys, bits of undistinguished plastic, bottle caps, lipstick tubes.... the list goes on and on. It's estimated that Albatross bring FIVE TONS of plastic marine debris to Midway Atoll EVERY year.

In November our group took to collecting lighters whenever we found them... We picked up 150 lighters even after a bag malfunction lost several on Eastern Island. This April we made a more conserted effort from the very begining of the trip. Every single person in the group participated, some passing me lighters as if they were covert secret messages. We collected 304.5 lighters in 6 days.

So why is it that we need to manufacture a toothbrush that you use only once, that goes on to last 100 years???? Where do people think these items end up? Many of us concientiously recycle every bit of plastic we can find and yet... some of this is still ending up in the oceans. 80% of the plastic in the ocean arrived there from stream and sewer run off. And not just from the coasts! A plastic bottle dropped in a storm sewer in South Dakota will make it's way along to a stream, then a river and eventually into the ocean where they float along, eventually becoming trapped in a current and grouping with other plastics.

Naturalist, Wayne Sentman, speaks to a group of visitors to Midway Atoll on the hazards of Marine Debris.

There are so many reasons this is a bad thing. Albatross ingest the plastic as they are feeding and return to feed this plastics to chicks in the nest. The chicks can't regurgitate and so they end us starving to death because the plastic makes then feel full. Turtles eat the plastic bags and die from stomach blockages. Larger bottles become brittle in the sun and break into smaller pieces. Many of these pieces have sharp edges which can perforate the stomach wall of any sea bird which eats it leading to massive infection and death. PCP and DDT is attracted to plastic bits. These toxins build up on the edges of the plastic... The bits break down into even smaller bits and are ingested by plankton and jellyfish... the toxins and plastic are condensed in the bottom of the food chain and has no where to go but up.... guess who is at the top...

So the next time you think, "Hey it isn't MY problem." Think again. This issue is touching us all.

A few things beyond just recycling that you can do to help:
1. Take tops off of plastic bottles. If they DO end up in the ocean they are more apt to fill with water and sink to the bottom, hopefully to be buried.
2. Participate in Beach and Roadway clean ups. Every bottle or piece of debris that is picked up from the road or beach and put in it's proper place to be disposed of is a piece of plastic that will not become marine debris.
3. Buy fewer plastics. Tracy Ammerman,Visitor Services Manager - Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, related how her purchasing decisions changed after experiencing the marine debris at Midway. She elected to spend $.50-cents more to buy a ceramic soap dish rather than a plastic one. Such a simple, every day item but a small price to pay to reduce the demand for plastics.
4. If you go on a cruise ship, encourage them to bring their garbage back to the US where it is more likely to be handled properly. Many cruise lines leave their garbage in foreign countries like Belize simply because it is less expensive. These countries are often ill equipped to handle the waste and it end up in run off and eventually in the oceans.
5. Encourage the manufacturers of your favorite products, by letters or email, to switch to shorter lived packaging. 100 years is too long for a bottle of laundry soap to stick around.

Hawaiian Green Turtle

The weather was so nice out on Midway... very different than in November. Warm summer days with a night light breeze, just enough to take the edge off without keeping you out of the water... unless you are an endangered Hawaiian Green Turtle. I had a good feeling when we found three turtles hauled out on a beach in Kona. The beach was pretty busy but there were signs asking people not to harass the turtles as they were "resting". Most people obeyed much to my delight.

Once we got to Sand Island on Midway Atoll (the only island of the three that is populated by humans) I checked out Turtle Beach. On one day I counted 15 turtles hauled out and saw several more cruising the shallow waters near the beach. The turtles are not actively nesting on Sand Island so he popular theory is that they are hauling out because of the high predator load in the waters surrounding the Atoll. Tiger sharks and Reef sharks are found in the waters in great abundance. In the late summer they feed on the unfortunate albatross chicks that don't learn to fly quickly enough. We spotted four different Reef sharks by the pier on a day we were returning from a snorkel trip. The good thing about the shallow water is that dark shapes like turtles, sharks and seals stand out from a great distance. It would be very difficult for one of these critters to sneak up on you if you were in the water.

There are other hazards out there for the turtles, man-made hazards.

Plastic bags floating in the ocean look a lot like jelly fish, a turtles favorite food. Once the bag is ingested it blocks the turtles stomach opening so it can't take in any real food. The turtle then starves to death. What you can do to help: Use a cloth bag for your groceries and keep using it. If you forget to bring your bag to the store, ask for paper which can then be recycled. Participate in a Beach Clean up day. Pick up any errant plastic bags you see in the street and place them in a proper waste receptacle.

Ghost nets: Turtles don't have very good eyesight. They can easily become entangled in netting that is adrift in the ocean and will drown. They don't have gills, they need to surface to breath! In 2003, NOAA and the Coast Guard removed 100,000 kilograms of derelict netting from the reefs in the Northwest Hawaiian Islands... in 2004 there was another 100,000 kilograms to be removed. The collected debris is transported to Honolulu where it is cut into managable pieces and then incinerated to create electrical energy which is then used by the residents of Oahu. In 2003 that was 111 metric tons which was enough to power 42 homes for a full year, the equivalent of 120 barrels of oil. This debris is worth far more out of the ocean!

The Stars of Midway Atoll

By far the Stars of Midway Atoll are the albatross. Both Laysan and the endangered Black-footed Albatross nest and rear their young on the three islands. They literally take over every available inch of ground space. Traveling around the roads in a golf cart can put you into a stand-off with an albatross... luckily they don't seem to find the hard roads as comfortable as the grass, weeds and sand so they rarely stand their ground on the road. There were a few occasions when I had to get out and give a little push to get a stubborn bird to move over.

The courtship dances are amazing to watch. There are a least 25 different moves the birds make when they dance with their mate. The dances of the Black-footed are subtly different from the Laysan. One wrong step and the mate will loose interest so it pays to practice. I saw many groups of non-breeding juveniles dancing together trying to get all the steps down.

The bill clacking and squeaking cry's of the albatross make a wonderful music. I found that I am missing it since I've been home. It's much harder to fall asleep to the sound of cars than it is to the sound of happy albatross.

Midway Atoll

Midway Atoll is located at the Northwestern-most end of the Hawaiian Islands chain, midway... between Japan and the United States mainland.

The first recorded visit to Midway Atoll occurred in 1859 by Captain N.C. Brooks of the Hawaiian Bark Gambia.

In 1903 President Roosevelt put the island in control of the US Navy. They cleared the island and turned it over to the Pacific Cable Company.

The first cable message to travel around the world went through Midway Island on the 4th of July 1903. It took 9 minutes.

In 1935 Midway became a playground for the rich and famous when the Pan American World Airways set up the Trans-Pacific Flying Clipper Seaplane service.

In 1941 the Navy moved in. In June of 1942 the historic Battle of Midway was waged between the US and Japan. This battle and the heavy losses by the Japanese is considered to be the turning point in the War in the Pacific.

In 1988 the Battle FOR Midway began. It has been a long journey from Military base to National Wildlife refuge, Battle of Midway National Memorial and the window to the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument.

Today Midway is host to well over 2 million sea birds as well as the Endangered Hawaiian Monk Seal and the Hawaiian Green Sea Turtle. The Atoll and islands enclosed in the protective reef have been closed to tourists since 2001. This year it has been reopened and permits were issued for the Oceanic Society to conduct educational tours. I was lucky enough to visit the Atoll just this past week with the Oceanic Society. It was nothing short of amazing. Stay tuned for the resaons I fell in love with Midway and her islands....