The ocean is full of rubbish, including food wrappers, beverage bottles, straws, cups and plates, bottle caps, single-use bags and countless cigarette butts. How is it that half of our rescued seals are entangled in fishing line, by far our most common culprit? Why is specifically fishing line responsible for so many entanglements?

Firstly, fishing line is built to capture and kill marine animals. It is its only purpose. Fishing line is designed to be invisible under water, and to withstand immense pressure, no matter if the captured species ends up being a turtle, dolphin or seal.

Second, fishing line often gets left behind in the ocean. It seems to be too much effort to bring it back to shore, or find a rubbish bin along the beach to discard it properly. There is no time to reel in knotted fishing line while fish is biting. It is easier and cheaper to cut the line and take a brand new one. There are almost never any inspectors on site to supervise the handling of rubbish. Because everybody does it, it is simply an accepted policy among fishermen. Is anybody even trying to prevent the practise of leaving fishing gear behind? Even well meaning fishermen cannot guarantee that they won't leave any broken off fishing line behind. Once in the sea, it stays in the sea.

Third, what happens at sea, stays at sea. It is certainly true for plastic rubbish. Fishing gear takes decades, if not centuries to break down into micro or nano plastics. Fishing line can be lying on the bottom of the ocean for years, and STILL kill an animal that gets too close to it. This process can repeat itself multiple times - that's how durable fishing line is!

Before we blame "Big Fishing", we do not want to forget about hobby angling. Recreational fishing is done for leisure, the amount and type of allowed catch is usually regulated by national law to keep fish stocks healthy.

It sounds perfect on paper. But here is the real catch: anglers are also responsible for a large percentage of ocean plastic and marine animal entanglements. Commercial fishing line is a much bigger problem, but we have seen many, many seals entangled in recreational fishing line, especially at Cape Cross.

How does a day of fishing at a pristine beach not include cleaning up after ourselves?

We have a lot of unanswered questions.

Is a sustainable fishing industry at all a possibility? Biodegradable fishing gear is unrealistic, self-regulation has proven to be an ineffective campaign promise from the polluters, the vast majority of the ocean is out of reach for inspectors, and many countries in the world do not seem to care, including our own Namibia.

The fishing industry does not take enough steps to address this issue. For ourselves, we have made the only decision to no longer support the industry and to cut all fish and seafood. We treat the repercussions of fishing every day, removing seafood from our diet seems to be the only reliable way to address the underlying issue.

We encourage you to do the same.

Please put us out of work.

Thank you from OCN