From romance to rubbish

New photo emerges of how our plastic waste is so cruel to nature.

What was supposed to be a romantic gesture, became a scene of today’s impact plastic waste is having on our wildlife.

Photographer Mary King was watching the ritual mating dance of great crested Grebe’s on the water at Clay Cross, south of Chesterfield last Sunday. However, instead of the finale being the ultimate romantic gift, it was actually a moment that demonstrates how human waste is affecting our wildlife.

The mating dance is an elegant showcase of wing flapping, feather ruffling ending when the make ducks down and fetches a weed from the bottom to give to his mate and a token of love. In this case the male retrieved an ugly, dangerous piece of plastic from the lakes depths.

Mary said ‘It’s usually a beautiful sight. The birds dive down to offer each other bits of weed and flick their heads back and forth.

‘It dropped the plastic back into the water afterwards. It was very sad and I thought it’s a current issue with people chucking rubbish.’ 

There is estimated to be 4,600 breeding pairs of Great Crested Grebes in Britain. These beautiful birds prefer swimming to flying, and are known for their ritual displays.

Once hunted for their plume of feathers, the numbers declined – nowadays we can clearly see how humans are still harming this beautiful birds.