Island sanctuary for seabirds is found littered with elastic bands
AN UNINHABITED island that is so remote a permit is required to visit has been littered with thousands of elastic bands, by seabirds mistakenly thinking they are worms.
Rangers who care for the colony on Mullion Island were initially left scratching their heads by the phenomenon, which has seen coloured bands strewn across the island.
It is thought to be caused by great black-backed and herring gulls mistaking the bands for food while feeding in agricultural fields on the mainland, before returning to deposit them at roosting sites on the island, which is off the Cornish coast.
Experts monitoring the twohectare rocky outpost found large numbers of tan, yellow and green bands among pellets regurgitated by the birds. Small bundles of green fishing net and twine were also uncovered
among the undigested food, likely mistaken by the gulls for morsels floating on the sea.
Rachel Holder, area ranger for the National Trust, said: “Ingested plastic and rubber is another factor in a long list of challenges which our gulls and
other seabirds must contend with just to survive.
“Despite being noisy and boisterous and seemingly common, gulls are on the decline.
“They’re already struggling with changes to fish populations and disturbance to nesting sites, and eating elastic bands and fishing waste does nothing to ease their plight.
“Places like Mullion Island should be sanctuaries for our seabirds, so it’s distressing to see them become victims of human activity.”
Mullion Island is a small, rocky outpost off the Lizard Peninsula, cared for by the National Trust, that provides a sanctuary for nesting seabirds including great black-backed gulls, herring gulls, cormorants and shags.
Despite public access to the isolated site being forbidden, the effects of human influence are increasingly evident. The bands are believed to have come from fields, where they are used to tie bunches of cut flowers.
The National Trust is calling on businesses to consider how they dispose of plastic, latex and other materials that could cause harm to wildlife.