Time to celebrate biodiversity and given that it's officially spring in the Northern Hemisphere, today we pay homage to an incredible natural phenomenon. Artist Chris Jordan is at Midway Island, the location of the Midway Atoll National Wildlife Refuge and the home of the world's largest population of Laysan Albatrosses. He is also filming an environmental tragedy because despite the remoteness of the island, plastic garbage (bottle caps, broken toys, lighters and so on) from all around the Pacific floats nearby and is mistaken for food by the parent albatrosses who then feed it to the chicks. With a bellyful of plastic, many of the chicks don't survive.
Here's a great 10-minute clip to show just how many birds have been nesting there this spring:
Here's a shorter clip a few weeks later showing several hatchlings:
I have blogged about plastic and Chris Jordan's work previously here or you can go
to the source and see the effects of our plastic debris at his website.
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