Temporal Trends and Potential Drivers of Stranded Marine Debris on Beaches Within Two US National Marine Sanctuaries Using Citizen Science Data

Abstract

Marine debris is a threat to our ocean that can be more effectively addressed through monitoring and assessment of items stranded on shorelines. This study engaged citizen scientists to conduct shoreline marine debris surveys according to a published NOAA protocol within the Greater Farallones and Olympic Coast National Marine Sanctuaries on the west coast of the United States. Here, we use the results of these multi-year monitoring data to estimate marine debris abundance and temporal trends, and identify drivers of debris loads. Changes in debris counts and composition are shown to reflect seasonal patterns of coastal upwelling and downwelling, but longer temporal trends in overall debris loads depend on the sampling window. Identifying drivers of stranded debris is challenging given the observational nature of the data. A linear increase in total expected debris counts was observed when up to five participants are conducting a survey, suggesting a need to standardize the number of participants and their search pattern for debris in shoreline monitoring efforts. Lastly, we discuss the application of shoreline marine debris data to evaluate the impact of management decisions and identify new targets for mitigation.

Distribution and Composition of Marine Debris in the Shoreline Area of Bone Bay Indonesia

“…At least the wind, ocean currents, and tides are closely related to the accumulation of debris in a place (Purba et al, 2021). According to Uhrin et al (2020), seasons influence debris loads on the United States west coast and occur more frequently in winter and spring (downwelling). In the context of Indonesia, with a wet and dry season, the outcomes will be different.…”

“…Therefore, it was important to understand local oceanographic processes driving seasonal changes. Furthermore, other environmental and anthropogenic factors are also related to the amount of waste, such as the type of beach access and the distance from city to beach (Uhrin et al, 2020).…”

Temporal trends in anthropogenic marine macro-debris and micro-debris accumulation on the California Channel Islands

“…Anthropogenic marine debris (AMD) in the ocean, and on shorelines, is a developing issue of global concern (Derraik, 2002;Barnes et al, 2009;Ribic et al, 2010;Galgani et al, 2015;Madricardo et al, 2020), even impacting areas that are remote, uninhabited, or have protected area status (Lavers and Bond, 2017;Whitmire et al, 2017;Uhrin et al, 2020). Marine debris consists of any persistent, manufactured or processed solid material discarded, disposed of, or abandoned in the marine and coastal environment (Marine Debris Research, Prevention, and Reduction Act, 2009;UNEP, 2009).…”

Understanding technological, cultural, and environmental motivators explaining the adoption of citizen science apps for coastal environment monitoring

“…CS is growing worldwide in marine and coastal ecological matters such as climate change (Marlowe et al, 2021), marine litter and debris (Papakonstantinou et al, 2021;Uhrin et al, 2020), environmental status assessment of communities, and habitats (Johnson et al, 2020;Turicchia et al, 2021), beach erosion (Pucino et al, 2021), early detection of invasive species (Datta et al, 2021;Sullivan & York, 2021), phytoplankton seawater discolorations (Siano et al, 2020), inland and coastal water quality (Malthus et al, 2020;Menon et al, 2021), microplastics (Camins et al, 2020), threatened species (LaRue et al, 2020), noise and air pollution (El-Kholei, 2020), and other areas of concern. Nevertheless, their success may be undermined by one very common setback in CS: the struggle to maintain citizens' motivation for continuous and sustained long-term participation (Kloetzer et al, 2021;Paul et al, 2020).…”