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YOUNG turtles off Australia鈥檚 Queensland coast are more at risk of swallowing plastic than their elders.

Autopsies on 246 sea turtles that washed up dead on beaches across Queensland showed that 58 had each ingested between one and 329 fragments of plastic. The rest died of other causes, such as boat collisions. Of the plastic fatalities, four were adults or near adults, 41 were juveniles and 13 were very young 鈥減ost-hatchlings鈥�.

One explanation is that young turtles swim nearer the surface, where plastic floats, and drift with plastic-rich currents. 鈥淚t may be that they are less selective than adults and encounter higher concentrations of debris,鈥� says Britta Denise Hardesty of the Australian federal agency CSIRO, who led the survey.

The team calculated how the risk of death rose as plastic in the gut increased, based on animal size and age. For young turtles about 45 centimetres long, swallowing 17 fragments raised the risk by 50 per cent. Swallowing one fragment carried a 22 per cent risk. Plastic can kill by blocking or perforating the gut (Scientific Reports, ).

This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淧lastic hits young turtles hardest鈥�