Accumulating Microscopic Plastic Threaten Our Shores
Microscopic plastic debris from washing clothes is accumulating in the marine environment and could be entering the food chain, a study has warned.Researchers traced the "microplastic" back to synthetic clothes, which released up to 1,900 tiny fibres per garment every time they were washed.
Earlier research showed plastic smaller than 1mm were being eaten by animals and getting into the food chain.The findings appeared in the journal Environmental Science and Technology.
"Research we had done before... showed that when we looked at all the bits of plastic in the environment, about 80% was made up from smaller bits of plastic," said co-author Mark Browne, an ecologist now based at the University of California, Santa Barbara.
"This really led us to the idea of what sorts of plastic are there and where did they come from."
Dr Browne, a member of the US-based research network National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, said the tiny plastic was a concern because evidence showed that it was making its way into the food chain.
"Once the plastics had been eaten, it transferred from [the animals'] stomachs to their circulation system and actually accumulated in their cells," he told BBC News.
In order to identify how widespread the presence of microplastic was on shorelines, the team took samples from 18 beaches around the globe, including the UK, India and Singapore.
"We found that there was no sample from around the world that did not contain pieces of microplastic."
There's not much we can do as divers about these microscopic pieces (unless you have Superman's telescopic ability...) but if you want to help us clean up larger pieces of palstic contributing to this accumulation, join us for a FREE DIVE on the last Saturday of every month on our Koh Tao Clean Up mission.
Technical Meets Marine Conservation again!We all knew the techies like to do things of DEEPest importance, so over the past few days Big Blue Tech teamed up with Big Blue Conservation to be involved in a reef clean-up project. Our 2 premier dive sites here on Koh Tao had fishing nets reportedly on them ranging from 35m to 18m which were causing not only a detriment to divers visiting the dive sites but also were trapping the marine life.
As this kind of project requires a certain knowledge level and expertise from a number of different sources we had a technical dive team (Cav & James) who were conducting the bottom/working phase of the dives, this meant that these guys could run into decompression if necessary and things would all be fine as everything was planned much deeper and longer than the actual depths. We also had a fish and marine expert (Emma), she was heavily involved in the organising of the actual trip and the person who was to brief all divers on dangerous and delicate marine life that was or may be caught in these nets. Also as with any project we couldn't have done this without the shallow support divers (Jason, Chris, Sarah & Rachel) and our fantastic surface cover guys (Nick, Stina & Sarah) who are simply there for the safety of the underwater teams, this requires great concentration and organisation to check everyone in and out of the water and make sure all limits were adhered to with respect to time and depth.
The team managed to pull lots of fishing net off the pinnacles and save lots of the marine life that was entangled within them. Unfortunately there was a lot of dead fish that had been trapped for a number of days prior to us getting there which is a little upsetting. Now these nets are removed and everything is back to normal on these tropical paradise reef environments, the visibility is improving and the dive sites are ready and waiting for divers to come exploring.
Congratulations to all divers involved in this project and thank you (from the deepest deco-depths of our hearts) for giving your time and efforts.
Cheers Cookie!Big Blue's DMT Cookie offered to shave his hair & beard on Xmas eve if people were willing to donate money to Big Blue Conservation & Save Koh Tao. DMT Dave grabbed the clippers, Cookie's hair came off and over 6,000 baht was raised. Hats (& hair) off for Cookie!
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Growing up nicely!Thank you Jason, Rich, Anke & Kevin for doing a great job yesterday monitoring our coral nursery and Sairee Reef! The nursery is looking great and our resident batfish family is growing. We will go back for another check very soon, and you are all more than welcome to come along and help out!
Happy New Year Eco warriors!!It's been one incredible year & Big Blue Conservation would like to thank you all for getting involved, helping out and making sure that Koh Tao stays green and clean! So let us just say one huge thank you to all our volunteers and to all Big Blue guests for choosing to stay and dive with Big Blue, one of Koh Tao's most eco-friendly resorts. Also a big thank you to Save Koh Tao and fellow eco teams on Koh Tao. We would like to wish you all a very happy new year, see you all in 2012 when there will be even more opportunities for you all to do something good for our paradise island!
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