Australia Archives - One Earth - One Ocean e. V.

The ugly face of tourism: Marine debris pollution linked to visitation in the southern Great Barrier Reef, Australia

guenther — Mon, 05 Jun 2017 18:55:46 +0000

Scott P. Wilson, Krista M. Verlis, The ugly face of tourism: Marine
debris pollution linked to visitation in the southern Great Barrier
Reef, Australia, Marine Pollution Bulletin, Volume 117, Issues 1–2, 15
April 2017, Pages 239-246, ISSN 0025-326X,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2017.01.036.
(http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0025326X17300486)
Abstract: Abstract
Marine debris is one of the most significant issues facing oceans
worldwide. The sources of this debris vary depending on proximity to
urban centres and the nature of activities within an area. This paper
examines the influence of tourism in the southern Great Barrier Reef
(GBR), and its contribution to litter levels in the region. By
conducting beach debris surveys on occupied and unoccupied islands, this
study found that debris was prevalent throughout the region with
significant differences in material types between locations. The
greatest source of debris from publically accessible islands was
tourist-related, with this source also influencing debris loads on
nearby uninhabited islands. A focus on debris at Heron Island, showed
that sites close to amenities had greater levels of tourist-sourced
items like cigarette butts. These findings indicate the contribution of
tourists to this problem and that working with operators and managers is
needed to minimise visitor impacts.
Keywords: Marine debris; Litter; Sources; Tourism; Great Barrier Reef;
Management

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A Bright and Lethal Tide

guenther — Wed, 31 Dec 2014 15:35:31 +0000

http://www.greatocean.com.au/2014/10/29/volume-14/

http://www.greatocean.com.au/volume-1-4/

CONTENTS

104 A Bright and Lethal Tide
Elizabeth Claire Alberts

http://www.globalgarbage.org.br/biblioteca/Great_Ocean_Quarterly_A_Bright_and_Lethal_Tide.pdf

A BRIGHT AND LETHAL TIDE

Studying Plastic Ingestion by Seabirds on Lord Howe Island

by Elizabeth Claire Alberts

The turboprop aircraft begins its descent, dipping below a thin veil of
cumulus clouds. I press my head against the window, searching for land,
but only see the blue expanse of the Tasman Sea. Then the plane turns,
revealing a crescent-shaped island with steep volcanic peaks and
turquoise-tinted coral reef lagoons. I?ve arrived at Lord Howe Island,
commonly touted as ?paradise on earth? or ?Australia?s crown jewel.? It
lives up to its reputation, too, with its stunning outcrops and a rare
coral reef system ? the southernmost coral reef in the world. But I?m
not here to lap up the scenery or to partake in normal tourist
activities like scuba diving, kayaking or hiking. Instead I?ve come to
learn about the flesh-footed shearwater (Puffinus carneipes), the
largest ?muttonbird? to breed on Lord Howe Island, and to understand why
shearwater chicks wash up (or ?wreck?) on the island?s coastlines every
year.

I first meet Dr. Jennifer Lavers, a slender, fair-haired Canadian with
boundless energy, at a ?Two Hands Project? beach cleanup at Manly Beach
in Sydney. As we sift bottle caps, drinking straws and plastic fragments
from the hot sand, I ask about her work with flesh-footed shearwaters on
Lord Howe Island. These birds are threatened, she tells me, and she
believes that plastic ingestion has a lot to do with it. When
shearwaters mistake plastic for food, it can lead to starvation or
poison them with heavy metal contamination. Fledglings, or chicks, seem
particularly susceptible to death by plastic, probably because they
can?t cough it up.

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Environmental Awareness: Plastic Pollution in Australia

guenther — Mon, 29 Dec 2014 21:44:27 +0000

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/biteradiome/2014/10/13/environmental-awareness-plastic-pollution-in-australia

Environmental Awareness: Plastic Pollution in Australia

Mon, October 13, 2014 10:00 pm Broadcast in Environment

Environmental Awareness: Plastic Pollution in Australia with Elizabeth
Beaumont

Elizabeth has worked as a Liver Intensive Care Nurse and has returned to
her studies, this time in the area of Sustainability at University of
Sunshine Coast, Queensland Australia. During a merging of two
assignments that concerned water extraction for the bottled water
industry and the ingestment of plastics by sea mammals and birds she
decided to approach the senior management of the university and make
formal presentations to phase out and subsequently ban the sale of water
housed in Polyethylene terephthalate at the University. She was
successful making her uni the 1st in Queensland and only the 2nd in
Australia to ban the sale of water in P.E .T. This will result in a
massive reduction of carbon emissions. The university has installed 3
ProAcqua machines the greatest innovation of water vends that ever have
been invented. In 2014 she travelled to Cambodia with the University and
was asked by the Minister of Tourism to advise on plastic pollution
there. Her work to communicate the dangers of this issue has been
enhanced by her steady efforts to connect with other interested people
including, experts in the broad field of plastic pollution. She actively
picks up plastic pollution and volunteers for the Two Hand Project and
applauds anyone who picks up plastics. She has for 30 years actively
practiced Nichiren Buddhism. Together with her family, Elizabeth enjoys
life on a Land for Wildlife property where marsupials, birds and aquatic
life live freely in the Hinterland of South East Queensland.

To contact Elizabeth email her at e_b043@student.usc.edu.au

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/biteradiome/2014/10/13/environmental-awareness-plastic-pollution-in-australia.mp3?localembed=download

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Left to pick up the pieces

guenther — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 20:00:44 +0000

http://www.michaelbgreen.com.au/left-pick-up-pieces

Left to pick up the pieces
in Environment, The Age on 8 October 2014

Plastic pollution in our waterways is getting worse fast. More and more
citizens are cleaning beaches, but can we stop litter at the source?

NICKO Lunardi, from Newport, is wearing a black t-shirt with two skulls
on it. He is 27 years old, an electrician, and a drummer in two punk
bands. He?s also the leader of a small group of volunteer beach cleaners
in Melbourne?s west.

It?s Sunday morning and a dozen people have slipped through a gap in the
fence to the Jawbone Reserve in Williamstown, the closest marine
sanctuary to the CBD. Parks Victoria?s website describes it as an
?unspoilt place? and a ?haven for coastal and marine life?.

It is full of trash. Lunardi picks up a fistful of sandy debris, shot
through with countless plastic chunks, lumps and specks. ?What can we do
with that?? he asks.

In the next hour, the group fills 16 large bags with plastic waste:
wrappers, bottles, straws, lighters, labels, lollipop sticks, thongs.
Plus rope, parking meter tickets, innumerable unknowable broken bits,
half a dozen syringes and a tyre.

Lunardi had been in the habit of cleaning up litter by himself. ?I felt
weird telling people I picked up rubbish,? he says. ?But then I
realised: ?No, I think they?re weird not picking up rubbish?.?

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Marine debris is selected as nesting material by the brown booby (Sula leucogaster) within the Swain Reefs, Great Barrier Reef, Australia

guenther — Thu, 09 Oct 2014 19:12:22 +0000

K.M. Verlis, M.L. Campbell, S.P. Wilson, Marine debris is selected as
nesting material by the brown booby (Sula leucogaster) within the Swain
Reefs, Great Barrier Reef, Australia, Marine Pollution Bulletin, Volume
87, Issues 1?2, 15 October 2014, Pages 180-190, ISSN 0025-326X,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.marpolbul.2014.07.060.
(http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0025326X14005190)
Abstract: Many seabirds are impacted by marine debris through its
presence in foraging and nesting areas. To determine the extent of this
problem, marine debris use in nest material of the brown booby (Sula
leucogaster) in the Great Barrier Reef, Australia, was investigated.
Nine cays were examined using beach and nest surveys. On average, four
marine debris items were found per nest (n = 96) with 58.3% of surveyed
nests containing marine debris. The source of marine debris in nests and
transects were primarily oceanic. Hard plastic items dominated both nest
(56.8%) and surveyed beaches (72.8%), however only two item types were
significantly correlated between these surveys. Nest surveys indicated
higher levels of black and green items compared to beach transects. This
selectivity for colours and items suggest these nests are not good
indicators of environmental loads. This is the first study to examine S.
leucogaster nests for marine debris in this location.
Keywords: Seabird; Plastic pollution; Threat; Beach survey;
Environmental indicator

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The oceans are full of our plastic ? here?s what we can do about it

guenther — Thu, 18 Sep 2014 17:47:14 +0000

https://theconversation.com/the-oceans-are-full-of-our-plastic-heres-what-we-can-do-about-it-31460

14 September 2014

The oceans are full of our plastic ? here?s what we can do about it

By Britta Denise Hardesty, CSIRO and Chris Wilcox, CSIRO

The Australian government has a ?threat abatement plan? which aims to
save marine animals from being harmed by rubbish. We set out to inform
this plan by developing a better understanding of where exactly this
rubbish comes from and how exactly it harms wildlife.

We surveyed the entire Australian coast at 100 km intervals, with help
from school groups and citizen scientists. We found that our shorelines
are littered with debris. About three-quarters of it is plastic and,
although there are some large items, 95% of the items are just a few
centimetres across, or smaller.

In Australian waters, you can expect to find anything from a few
thousand to more than 40,000 pieces of plastic per square kilometre.

http://csironewsblog.com/2014/09/15/the-oceans-are-full-of-our-plastic-heres-what-we-can-do-about-it/

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Understanding the Sources and Effects of Abandoned, Lost, and Discarded Fishing Gear on Marine Turtles in Northern Australia

guenther — Thu, 14 Aug 2014 19:10:10 +0000

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cobi.12355/abstract

WILCOX, C., HEATHCOTE, G., GOLDBERG, J., GUNN, R., PEEL, D. and
HARDESTY, B. D. (2014), Understanding the Sources and Effects of
Abandoned, Lost, and Discarded Fishing Gear on Marine Turtles in
Northern Australia. Conservation Biology. doi: 10.1111/cobi.12355

Abstract
Globally, 6.4 million tons of fishing gear are lost in the oceans
annually. This gear (i.e., ghost nets), whether accidently lost,
abandoned, or deliberately discarded, threatens marine wildlife as it
drifts with prevailing currents and continues to entangle marine
organisms indiscriminately. Northern Australia has some of the highest
densities of ghost nets in the world, with up to 3 tons washing ashore
per kilometer of shoreline annually. This region supports globally
significant populations of internationally threatened marine fauna,
including 6 of the 7 extant marine turtles. We examined the threat ghost
nets pose to marine turtles and assessed whether nets associated with
particular fisheries are linked with turtle entanglement by analyzing
the capture rates of turtles and potential source fisheries from nearly
9000 nets found on Australia's northern coast. Nets with relatively
larger mesh and smaller twine sizes (e.g., pelagic drift nets) had the
highest probability of entanglement for marine turtles. Net size was
important; larger nets appeared to attract turtles, which further
increased their catch rates. Our results point to issues with trawl and
drift-net fisheries, the former due to the large number of nets and
fragments found and the latter due to the very high catch rates
resulting from the net design. Catch rates for fine-mesh gill nets can
reach as high as 4 turtles/100 m of net length. We estimated that the
total number of turtles caught by the 8690 ghost nets we sampled was
between 4866 and 14,600, assuming nets drift for 1 year. Ghost nets
continue to accumulate on Australia's northern shore due to both legal
and illegal fishing; over 13,000 nets have been removed since 2005. This
is an important and ongoing transboundary threat to biodiversity in the
region that requires attention from the countries surrounding the
Arafura and Timor Seas.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/cobi.12355/suppinfo

Disclaimer: Supplementary materials have been peer-reviewed but not
copyedited.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/store/10.1111/cobi.12355/asset/supinfo/cobi12355-sup-0001-SupMat.docx?v=1&s=bbdd128d52aa28153b8fe2a594bf41504b8d7270

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1523-1739/earlyview

Early View (Online Version of Record published before inclusion in an issue)

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