Laboratory of Insect Evolutionary Biology and Ecology, Faculty of Biology, University of Bialystok, Konstantego Ciołkowskiego 1J, 15-245 Białystok, Poland.
Laboratory of Insect Evolutionary Biology and Ecology, Faculty of Biology, University of Bialystok, Konstantego Ciołkowskiego 1J, 15-245 Białystok, Poland.
Sci Total Environ. 2022 Dec 20;853:158621. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.158621. Epub 2022 Sep 7.
Microplastic pollution is one of the leading global conservation issues. The aim of this study was to investigate the occurrence of microplastics in the gastrointestinal tracts of Common Blackbirds Turdus merula (N = 16) and Song Thrushes Turdus philomelos (N = 18), songbirds with exceptionally terrestrial lifestyles and a wide distribution range. We searched for microplastics of over 100 μm in size and assessed whether their contamination differed regarding the age of the birds and the time of year. We used birds that had died as a result of collision with anthropogenic infrastructure, which were sampled during wildlife monitoring of anthropogenic infrastructures and citizen science projects in north-eastern Poland. We found that all the analysed individuals contained microplastic in their gastrointestinal tracts, which were classified as fibers, fragments, films and pellets. A total number of 1073 microplastics were observed, mostly consisting of fibers (84 %) and films (10 %) below 1 mm in size. The dominant colours of microplastics were transparent (75 %) and brown (14 %). The species average microplastic concentration was higher in Song Thrushes (40.1) than Common Blackbirds (21.9), however the difference was not statistically significant. Moreover, we found no seasonal or age-related differences in microplastic ingestion in either species. While our results show a ubiquity of microplastics in terrestrial environments, they also indicate that thrushes have the potential to be used as indicators of microplastic pollution in terrestrial ecosystems.
微塑料污染是全球主要的保护问题之一。本研究旨在调查普通乌鸫（Turdus merula）（N=16）和歌鸫（Turdus philomelos）（N=18）的胃肠道中微塑料的存在情况，这两种鸟类具有非常陆生的生活方式和广泛的分布范围。我们搜索了大于 100μm 的微塑料，并评估了它们的污染是否因鸟类的年龄和年份而有所不同。我们使用因与人为基础设施碰撞而死亡的鸟类，这些鸟类是在波兰东北部的人为基础设施野生动物监测和公民科学项目中采样的。我们发现所有分析的个体的胃肠道中都含有微塑料，这些微塑料被分类为纤维、碎片、薄膜和颗粒。共观察到 1073 个微塑料，主要由小于 1mm 的纤维（84%）和薄膜（10%）组成。微塑料的主要颜色是透明（75%）和棕色（14%）。这两个物种的平均微塑料浓度在歌鸫中（40.1）高于普通乌鸫（21.9），但差异无统计学意义。此外，我们在两个物种中都没有发现微塑料摄入与季节或年龄有关的差异。虽然我们的研究结果表明微塑料在陆地环境中普遍存在，但也表明歌鸫有可能成为陆地生态系统中微塑料污染的指示物。
