Short-term tourism alters abundance, size, and composition of microplastics on sandy beaches

Abstract

Microplastics have become a global threat to sandy beach ecosystems. To efficiently manage this threat, potential sources of microplastics should be deeply understood, which requires direct evidence as this is always a challenging task. Previous studies have reported various sources; however, the topic still needs attention to identify other potential sources of microplastics on sandy shores. Therefore, the abundance, size, color, shape, and polymer type of microplastics on nine sandy shores of the Turkish Coast of the Black Sea were examined before and after the regular tourism season to understand whether short-term tourism might be an important source. A total of 3402 microplastic items from 270 sand samples were obtained and examined. Both the abundance and the average size of the microplastics increased after the tourism season associated with the potential number of visitors and beach cleaning efforts. Further, the color, shape, and polymer type of microplastics varied between sampling times. Beach cleaning seemed to be an efficient way to minimize the adverse effect of short-term tourism influence. This study clearly identifies short-term tourism as an important source of microplastics on sandy shores and beach cleaning as an important tool to minimize microplastic abundance. The results of this study are important insights into current literature by identifying another source of microplastics on sandy shores, which should be useful for the potential management actions to reduce the harm of these global pollutants.