Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Articles 1 - 1 of 1
Full-Text Articles in Biology
Bringing Home The Trash: Do Differences In Foraging Lead To Increased Plastic Ingestion In Laysan Albatrosses?, L C. Young, C Vanderlip, D C. Duffy, V Afanasyev, Scott A. Shaffer
Bringing Home The Trash: Do Differences In Foraging Lead To Increased Plastic Ingestion In Laysan Albatrosses?, L C. Young, C Vanderlip, D C. Duffy, V Afanasyev, Scott A. Shaffer
Faculty Publications, Biological Sciences
When searching for prey, animals should maximize energetic gain, while minimizing energy expenditure by altering their movements relative to prey availability. However, with increasing amounts of marine debris, what once may have been ‘optimal’ foraging strategies for top marine predators, are leading to sub-optimal diets comprised in large part of plastic. Indeed, the highly vagile Laysan albatross (Phoebastria immutabilis) which forages throughout the North Pacific, are well known for their tendency to ingest plastic. Here we examine whether Laysan albatrosses nesting on Kure Atoll and Oahu Island, 2,150 km apart, experience different levels of plastic ingestion. Twenty two geolocators were …