Alarm plastic trash appears in the fry

The world once shaken when witnessing the corpse of sea turtles, birds, whales . filled with plastic waste inside the body. However, recent research shows that plastic waste also appears in young fish.

According to a study by the University of Georgia (US), ocean plastic waste originates mainly from the mainland and rivers, then follows the water flow to the sea.

The amount of ocean plastic waste can be up to 9 million tons a year.

Over time with the effects of light, wind, sea currents, these pieces of waste were separated very small with a size of less than 1mm.

Scientists also analyzed many ocean water samples and showed that there exist plastic molecules such as polyethylene and polypropylene that have a long-term impact on the environment.

Only one glove can contain lots of tiny pieces of plastic waste - (Photo: The New York Times).

One of the studies conducted by the team of Jonathan Whitney and Jamison Gove (American Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration - NOAA) has dissected 650 newly hatched fry and discovered about 60 fish containing plastic waste pieces. inside.

With newly born fish, eating is extremely important, helping them to maintain life in every day. If the first meal is eaten with plastic waste, fish does not have enough calories to feed the body so that it can die on the first day.

Even these tiny pieces of trash can tear the fry of the fry.

Scraps of trash can contain bacteria that are harmful to young shrimps when they are just formed - (Photo: The New York Times)

"Juveniles have overcome many new obstacles that can be born. No more than 1% of eggs from a mother can hatch into fry and can survive under the impact of many factors such as fertilization, danger. from predatory fish . Now they face plastic waste " - Mr. Gove said.

In the long term, in some laboratory studies, scientists found that when there was plastic in the body, fish and fish-eating species - including humans - would reduce appetite, and The body cannot develop its usual size.

Plastic waste in the body also causes fish to suffer reproductive disorders later."The first is the ability to spawn fewer eggs, which in turn can reduce the number of fish in the ocean which are at an alarming level," said Susanne Brander, a toxicologist at Oregon University (USA).

The fry are affected by plastic waste that the study found - (Photo: The New York Times).

These types of micro-waste can affect fish - (Photo: The New York Times).

Juveniles are very sensitive to plastic waste, because they have no experience distinguishing between safe and non-hazardous foods. In addition, they do not receive careful care from their parents.

Many studies show that fish are the most "insensitive" parents when most of them produce hundreds of thousands or even millions of eggs but never look after the eggs, how many eggs hatch into small fish. .

Correlation in size of micro plastic waste and newborn fish - (Photo: The New York Times).

If fry are "attacked" by plastic waste, this will leave a big impact on nature because fish is an extremely important link to the global food chain.

Currently, fish is a source of protein for nearly 3 billion people and countless seabirds and other aquatic animals. However, the current number of fish has decreased by half compared to 1970, some species such as natural salmon also have a great reduction, nearly 2/3.

The reason is that they are caught by humans in an eradication manner, the impact of environmental pollution as well as the consequences of climate change globally.

And today, there may be more causes from tiny pieces of plastic waste .

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