sOs! save Our seals FROM PLASTIC PERIL
A COLONY of seals on a remote British beach will tonight become a symbol of the horrors of plastic pollution.
The toll taken on grey seals getting tangled in plastics ranging from fishing nets to stray bikinis to frisbees will be revealed by a Channel 5 film designed to raise funds to help animals.
Conservationists who work with the seals say the problem is getting worse every year. Only this week a seal was rescued from the beach at Horsey in north Norfolk with a pink frisbee round her neck. She is one of several seals that are slowly being strangled or starving to death after playfully investigating frisbees in the sea when young only to get them stuck round their necks. They then have to live with them biting deeper and deeper into their flesh as they grow.
Last year a seal was found with a yellow frisbee throttling her and rescued by Friends of Horsey Seals (FoHS) and taken to the RSPCA’s nearby East Winch Wildlife Centre. The seal was named Mrs Frisbee, treated successfully and a few months later released back into the wild.
But David Vyse, a volunteer with FoHS, yesterday said her successor has just been saved in a joint operation with Marine & Wildlife Rescue.
Caught
He said: “We rescued Mrs Pink Frisbee on Wednesday and it was horrific. The frisbee had cut deeply into her neck, which was red raw. There was a terrible smell. She must have been in a great deal of pain. But my colleague Peter Ansell took her to the RSPCA where they removed the necklace.
“At the moment we have another five or six seals off Horsey that have frisbees round their necks. We don’t know where all these frisbees are coming from. It is the height of the pupping season so we need the right conditions to catch them so they can be treated. Seals are also caught up in fishing nets and nylon rope. The problem is getting worse. We have been watching the seals for 15 years and it has never been as bad as this. The injuries can be really, really bad.”
The saga of the seals appears tonight on Channel 5 in the UK’s first ever three-hour telethon for animals.
Funds raised will go to the RSPCA, Blue Cross, The Donkey Sanctuary, Scottish SPCA, and The Wildlife Aid Foundation. And the campaign was backed by TV mogul Simon Cowell who sent a message from him and his partner, Lauren Silverman, and their pets urging viewers to donate. He said: “This helps five animal charities across the UK. So this is something I think is really important. You will all go to heaven for doing this. So from myself, and Lauren, and Eric, and Squiddly, and Diddly, and Freddy, we want to say thank you from the humans and woof from the dogs, which means thank you in dog language.”
In recent months FoHS has taken a young seal to the RSPCA with microfine fishing net embedded in its neck but it was too late. The seal died from its wounds. There was a happier ending for another seal that was being choked by a rope, which also trailed 12ft behind it in the sea, surviving after veterinary treatment by the RSPCA.
East Winch manager Alison Charles told yesterday
how her team saved Mrs Pink Frisbee or Pinkafo: “We hope Pinkafo has the strength to pull through, but she is definitely not out of the woods yet and the next few days will be critical. “Her predicament had been known for some time, with many sightings of her, but unfortunately it was impossible to catch her until she had deteriorated so badly that she had become very weak.
“It is heartbreaking to think that this could have been prevented if people just took extra care with their litter. Many people are just unaware of the problems discarded plastic can cause for our wildlife.”