increasing sustainability awareness

Posts tagged ‘litter’

What a week to be Gruene…

This week we focused on what effect litter has on the wildlife in our oceans.  Did you know that the plastic rings that hold a six pack of soda cans together can harm our sea animals?  Have you ever wondered how the trash gets from land into the oceans?  We did some investigating and here is a little about what we found out.


  • Seals, dolphins, turtles and other marine wildlife can become trapped in nets and plastic items.  The objects slip around their necks and the animals cannot get free from them.  As the animal grows, the netting or plastic stays attached to them causing them to choke or starve to death.  We were really sad about that.
  • We found out that in 1987 a law was passed that made it illegal to dump plastics into the ocean.  We want to know if people are not allowed to dump plastic in the ocean, why are we still having so much trouble with it ending up there anyway.  What can we do to help keep it from harming more marine animals?
  • The Center for Marine Conservation lists the following 12 items as most frequently found in the ocean.  They are nicknamed the “dirty dozen”:  cigarette butts, paper pieces, plastic pieces, styrofoam, glass pieces, plastic food bags, plastic caps and lids, metal beverage cans, plastic straws, glass beverage bottles, plastic beverage bottles, and styrofoam cups.
By looking at the list, we can tell that everything is a problem, but what can we do to help reduce the amount of plastic ending up in our oceans?  Is there an alternative material that could be used?

This is a website we used to help us understand these things.