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Plastic Ingestion by Phocoena Phocoena and Tursiops Truncatus from the Black Sea

2023; Springer International Publishing; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1007/978-3-031-26754-3_26

2367-3370

Svetlana Mihova, Valentina Doncheva, Kremena Stefanova, Elitsa Stefanova, Dimitar Popov, Marina Panayotova,

Arctic and Russian Policy Studies

Stomach contents and intestines of two species of cetaceans from the superfamily toothed whales (Odontoceti), collected in the western part of the Black Sea during the period 2020–2021 were inspected for the presence of plastic particles. Microplastics (<5 mm) were found in all 2 bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops truncatus ssp. ponticus Barabash-Nikiforov, 1940) from the dolphin family (Delphinidae) and micro- and mesoplastics (5–25 mm) were found in 24 of 29 harbour porpoises (Phocoena phocoena ssp. relicta Abel, 1905) from the porpoise family (Phocoenidae). A total of 197 plastic particles were recorded in 26 individuals (84% of all individuals examined, 21 of 25 female and 5 of 6 male animals). The average number of plastic particles per cetacean was 6.35 ± 6.92 par.ind., ranged 0 to 25 per individual. The most common type of plastic identified were fibres (43%) and fragments (36%). The most frequent plastic colour recognized was grey, blue and black.