The Plastic Pollution of Fishing Gear Is Much Worse Than Straws

If you care about the environment, it’s time to start talking about the 640,000 tons of discarded fishing gear killing ocean creatures

On good days, Dr. Sarah Sharp gets to watch living North Atlantic Right Whales. The school-bus sized, dark creatures, with scoop-like mouths and white spots on their face, sometimes launch themselves out of the water, like leaping ballerinas. They’ll breach and play with each other, a behavior once thought to be a mating display, but was later found to take place outside of the mating season. It’s likely the animals are just socializing, having fun with the other whales.

Sharp also enjoys watching them feeding peacefully. “They literally just mow the grass underwater with their mouths open, filter feeding with their baleen, getting all the little crustaceans out of the water column,” Sharp explained. “It’s kind of a zen like experience to watch these animals, going so smoothly along, just under the water surface.”

North American Right Whale. Photo: NOAA

Unfortunately, Dr. Sharp, a veterinarian and marine mammal stranding coordinator at the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW), mostly looks at dead whales. And none of the whales she has studied in the last 16 years died a natural death after a long life.

Sharp is the lead author of a recent study published in the journal Diseases of Aquatic Organisms. The study, spearheaded by the International Fund For Animal Welfare, focused on determining causes of death for North Atlantic right whales between 2003 and 2018.

When a North Atlantic right whale dies, they sometimes wash ashore, or are found out at sea, floating in the water. When someone reports an animal, a scientist can perform a necropsy, or animal autopsy, to try and figure out how the creature died. The researchers who provided data for this study found the cause of death of 43 whales. 88 percent, or 38 animal deaths, were human-caused. The study doesn’t include 2019 deaths — in June alone, six more North Atlantic right whales have been found dead.

Once boldly leaping from the water, now the animals are too often found dead, propeller marks on their backs or fishing gear wrapped around their faces, limbs and tails. Dead in the most painful and unnecessary ways.

16 animals from the study died from ship strikes. 22 died from getting entangled in fishing gear. That means fishing gear alone killed more than half of North Atlantic right whales, out of the ones whose deaths we know the cause of, in the past 16 years.

The charismatic creatures, with complex social lives, integral roles in their environments, and majestic displays, are down to about 400, with fewer than 100 breeding females left alive. Once boldly leaping from the water, now the animals are too often found dead, propeller marks on their backs or fishing gear wrapped around their faces, limbs and tails. Dead in the most painful and unnecessary ways.

We love whales just as we love turtles and sharks, calling out for change when we see the animals with straws stuck in their nose or having their fins cut off for soup. And yet, despite the very well-documented pervasiveness of fishing gear as a fatal and copious presence in the ocean, having killed hundreds of thousands of the animals we love, it is not often part of the public conversation regarding ocean plastics.

Why?

The Problem

There has been something of an explosion of interest in plastic pollution in the ocean as an issue affecting environmental, animal, and human health for the worse. National Geographic even recently made an iconic cover story called Planet or Plastic? explaining the history and role of plastic in human hands. It’s both integral to our daily lives as consumers, and harming our environment and health.

People are responding, though. “We are on the right track,” explained Dianna Cohen, CEO and co-founder of Plastic Pollution Coalition. “We are at an incredible moment in time where awareness of the issue is at an all-time high.” The ocean has “basically become a plastic soup,” Cohen said, and awareness means action. Plastic Pollution Coalition created a plastic pollution reduction legislative toolkit, and cities, countries, businesses, and individuals around the world have enacted policies to address single-use plastics.

We’ve known for decades that single-use plastics like bags and water bottles are an issue. There’s something tragically profligate about using something for two minutes and then that thing lasting virtually forever. It’s nearly impossible for an average, modern city-dweller to go plastic-free completely (where are you going to buy food without packaging?), but the movement to reduce use of plastic straws has had serious recent momentum over the last year.

However, none of the North Atlantic Right Whales that Sharp studied had died due to plastic straws. It was almost all fishing gear and boat strikes. Furthermore, the National Resources Defense Council estimates that 650,000 marine mammals like whales and seals are killed or seriously injured in gear from non-US fisheries annually. Marine mammals, like whales and seals, are not usually caught to feed any hungry human — just caught to die. The United Nations estimates that 640,000 tons of lost, abandoned or discarded fishing gear enters the ocean each year, making up roughly a tenth of marine litter globally.

The lines caught can cause choking, thrashing, infection, and disability. Dragging gear can slow them down enough that they have trouble migrating, mating, and feeding. Sometimes they become trapped in a way that they cannot reach the surface for air, and suffocate.

The fishing industry harms a lot of animals unintentionally, but not all of it is inevitable. Outside of “target” species, meaning animals killed to provide food for humans, 40% of the animals caught by active fishers is bycatch, according to the nonprofit Oceana. Sometimes fishing gear is accidentally lost or intentionally thrown overboard, becoming “ghost gear” and continuing to trap, drown and kill animals for years on end. It can even result in a cycle of death, catching animals that are lured to the traps by the ones who died before them.

A Right Whale disentanglement filmed by NOAA

North Atlantic Right Whales are sometimes caught in abandoned fishing gear, but they are more often the victims of actively-used fishing gear. Sharp emphasizes that these deaths are tragic on multiple levels. The anthropogenic, or human-caused, deaths are environmentally devastating, untimely, and excruciating. “Oftentimes the line from entanglement is cutting deeply into their flippers and causing a partial amputation,” Sharp explained. “So, just imagine a human walking around with a line that’s wrapped around his leg so tight that it’s actually cutting into the femur of the leg.” The lines caught can cause choking, thrashing, infection, and disability. Dragging gear can slow them down enough that they have trouble migrating, mating, and feeding. Sometimes they become trapped in a way that they cannot reach the surface for air, and suffocate.

So, when we stop to think about whether we should stuff our reusable water bottle in our bags, or just buy one on the way to work, should we not also be thinking about whether to have the fish or the knish for lunch?

Public Perception

A NOAA scientist removes derelict fishing gear from the reefs of Pearl and Hermes Atoll. Photo: NOAA

The public attention on discarded or dangerous forms of fishing gear seems to be lacking in urgency. Joel Baziuk, acting deputy director of the Global Ghost Gear Initiative, explains. “Until the last couple of years where it’s really started to gain traction, this is mostly due to the fact that [ghost gear is] largely a subsurface — and therefore unseen — issue,” he said. “Plastic bags, bottles, straws, balloons, etc. are the most common items that we see washing up on beaches, so there’s a good amount of public awareness about it, as they’re experiencing it first-hand.”

“Obviously there’s more nuance to it than that, but that’s a quick answer,” he added.

Plastic straws and styrofoam to-go boxes, of course, are much simpler to criticize than the Leviathan that is the fishing industry. Fishing has not only substantial environmental impacts, but economic and nutritional impacts as well. According to FAO, fish account for nearly 17% of the protein that humans eat. We’re not about to completely ditch fish.

Starting with a Straw

On the other hand, it wouldn’t be too hard for most people to completely ditch straws.

Dune Ives is the executive director of Lonely Whale, an ocean conservation organization that developed the campaign “For a Strawless Ocean.” Ives has a PhD in psychology and has focused on initiating and supporting positive behavioral changes. When Lonely Whale began, the founders knew that they wanted to get people engaged with the ocean, to feel empowered to be able to do something about it in their daily lives. That includes people who aren’t involved in conservation or politics, and even those who have never seen the ocean. The straw seemed like a simple enough start.

“And that really worked, sparking a conversation about what’s next,” she continued.

Still, there is some controversy around anti-straw campaigns. The Center for Disability Rights calls straw bans “ableist,” and that they create an extra challenge for people who need them. (Most straw bans ok straws on request.)

An editorial in the journal Marine Policy even proposed that the focus on plastics in the ocean distracts from “bigger” issues in the marine environment, like overfishing and climate change. If you start by forgoing plastic straws, is that a gateway into making more personal, political and economic changes that will protect the ocean, as Ives suggests?

“The point with the straw campaign was quite honestly not about the straw. It really was a metaphor for change. It really spoke to people.”

Or will straw bans lead to environmental complacency, as the Marine Policy editorial suggests? The authors agree with ocean conservation organizations that ocean plastic is an issue worth fighting against, however, if it doesn’t take away from other issues. But even specific to the plastic issue, could the focus on plastic straws be a distraction from the enormity of discarded fishing gear?

Ives believes the straw campaign moved plastic pollution reduction forward, in addition to the impact made by the actual reduction of straw use. “The point with the straw campaign was quite honestly not about the straw,” she said. “It really was a metaphor for change. It really spoke to people.”

Lonely Whale is, too, moving forward. One of their current projects is the Next Wave Plastics Initiative, which promotes the creation and sale of products that are made from trash fished out of the ocean.

How bad is it?

The plastic pollution impact of fishing gear is definitely worse, as a whole, than that of plastic straws or bags. But it’s not easy to calculate the precise impact of one individual action versus another. “There’s no question plastic straws cause harm,” Ives said. “But you can’t identify, for example, ‘for every ten straws served, three go in a turtle’s nose.’ We don’t track them at that level.” At least we can say for sure that every crab eaten is at least one crab dead. And probably some portion of other animals.

Derelict fishing gear and other large marine debris were removed from remote Alaskan shorelines by the Gulf of Alaska Keeper. Photo: NOAA

We have lots of numbers to worth with in regards to plastic pollution in the ocean, but not all of them paint a clear picture about impact. Jacqueline Savitz is chief policy officer for North America for Oceana, a nonprofit focused on affecting policy in order to protect the oceans and sustainable fishing. While Oceana acknowledges the severity of fishing gear in the ocean, Savitz says that, sometimes, discussion of the issue is overblown. In response to coverage stating that the Great Pacific Garbage Patch is mostly made of fishing gear, cited by National Geographic and nonprofit The Great Ocean Cleanup, Savitz points out that the study referenced used aircraft surveys, meaning that they’re focusing on what’s on the top. “The ocean’s really deep,” she said.

Savitz would prefer to hold accountable the companies that make plastics, in the hopes that they will offer sustainable alternatives. “As long as we’re stuck talking about fishing gear,” Savitz said, “we’re never going to get back to the fact that the only solution to the plastics problem is to make and use less plastics overall, throughout our entire economy.”

Looking Forward

Marine scientists predict that, given the current track, North Atlantic right whales will all be dead by 2037. Sparks says that the whales can tolerate less than one death per year — and there have been six in a month.

Let’s be clear — we are not on track to saving the North Atlantic right whale. Once the population is small enough, their genetic will bottleneck and they will either stop having babies or inbreed too much to be viable. Marine scientists predict that, given the current track, North Atlantic right whales will all be dead by 2037. Sparks says that the whales can tolerate less than one death per year — and there have been six in a month.

But all is not lost. Maybe we can slow the right whale plight, so one last generation can see them. Or maybe we can save the next charismatic animal that is prone to getting caught in nets.

And, there are some practical initiatives happening among stakeholders and changemakers. FAO is working to create voluntary guidelines for marking fishing gear, so that companies can be held responsible if and when non-target animals are found dead in their nets. In March, congress passed the “SAVE Right Whales Act,” which funds research into the whales and into safer net technologies.

What You Can Do

If you’re not the CEO of a fishing company, or on the high seas pulling creatures out of the ocean as your job, there are still some things that you can do. Leah Garcés, president of the vegan outreach organization Mercy for Animals, said in a statement: “It stands to reason that if we collectively reduce our fish consumption, we will reduce the amount of ghost gear in our oceans. But the burden shouldn’t fall entirely on the consumer.” Legislation like S. 2773 would help phase driftnets out of US waters by 2020, and funding and support for fish-free alternative foods can help as well. NOAA and Oceana don’t advocate for consumers to boycott the fish industry, but they do agree that it’s not entirely up to consumers to prevent the tragedy of fishing gear killing non-target species.

If you’re particularly troubled by the deaths of right whales and other marine creatures, you can help by collecting fishing gear from the ocean and properly getting rid of it. Or, if you don’t live on a beach, you can support organizations like the Global Ghost Gear Initiative that help collect ghost gear. At the voting booth, you can support legislation that requires fishing companies to tag their fishing gear, so if it gets thrown into the ocean irresponsibly, they can be held accountable. At the dinner table, you can vote with your dollar by researching the most sustainable fish — or to keep it simple, reducing or eliminating fish from your diet altogether.

“There’s been some good discussion, but what we really need to see is action,” says Sharp. “There needs to be policy changes and management changes that get the line out of the water column, and it needs to happen soon. We don’t have a lot of time.”

What does it mean for you to reduce your plastic straws and bottles? Will you become complacent that you’ve already done your part — or are you ready for the next step?