Seals don’t wear baseball caps. At least not on purpose, but seals are curious creatures, so every now and then a seal will accidentally find some sort of discarded material, poke around in it and, if they’re unlucky, get stuck in it. That’s exactly what happened to a seal in Namibia, just a stone’s throw from the ridiculous gulf called Skeleton Bay.
“This is not the first time we have had to cut a baseball cap from a seal’s neck,” the Ocean Conservation Namibia team wrote. “Various manufacturers use a whole range of fabrics to make their caps. They can be natural fabrics such as cotton or wool, or synthetic materials such as polyamide or any other material that can be molded into the desired shape.”
Even if those manufacturers use material that breaks down over time, seals simply don’t have the time to wait for that. And since they don’t have fingers or arms for that matter, it’s impossible to get a piece of anything stuck (like a HAZMAT suit) off.
“Let this rescue video remind us all,” concluded Ocean Conservation Namibia, “that textiles also contribute to ocean waste and that marine animals are always the undeserving victims of litter.”
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