News

New report: Monitoring plastics in Northern fulmars

Published on
October 6, 2014

Commissioned by the Netherlands Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment, IMARES has published its new monitoring report on quantities of plastics in stomachs of Northern Fulmars found on Dutch beaches up to year 2013.

The added two years of data suggest a decrease in quantities of plastics, but are not significant over the past ten years. Currently, 94% of investigated stomachs of Dutch Fulmars contained one or more plastic particles, and about 52% contained more than the critical level of 0.1 gram plastic. North Sea governments have set a policy target where this percentage is reduced to below 10%.

The graph suggests a slow decrease in the percentage of fulmars that has more than 0.1 gram of plastic in the stomach. However, the trend is not significant, and the target of the proportion of such birds being under 10% is distant (red horizontal line).
The graph suggests a slow decrease in the percentage of fulmars that has more than 0.1 gram of plastic in the stomach. However, the trend is not significant, and the target of the proportion of such birds being under 10% is distant (red horizontal line).
Beached fulmars, collected by volunteers throughout the Netherlands, are dissected at IMARES Texel. The standard methods include records of many external and inte rnal charact ers that can indicate the age, sex, body - con dition, origin, breeding status, cause of death , etc., all variables that might be relevant in later specific data analyses.
Beached fulmars, collected by volunteers throughout the Netherlands, are dissected at IMARES Texel. The standard methods include records of many external and inte rnal charact ers that can indicate the age, sex, body - con dition, origin, breeding status, cause of death , etc., all variables that might be relevant in later specific data analyses.
Stomach content of Fulmar NET - 2012 - 051, separated for the large glandular forestomach (proventriculus) and the small muscular second stomach (gizzard). Most plastics are usually found in the gizzard, which grinds harder prey items (and debris) into pieces small enough to enter the gut. Accumulation in the proventriculus only occuurs when the gizzard is full or item s are too large to enter the gizzard.
Stomach content of Fulmar NET - 2012 - 051, separated for the large glandular forestomach (proventriculus) and the small muscular second stomach (gizzard). Most plastics are usually found in the gizzard, which grinds harder prey items (and debris) into pieces small enough to enter the gut. Accumulation in the proventriculus only occuurs when the gizzard is full or item s are too large to enter the gizzard.