Images of a mother bird feeding a cigarette butt to its baby shows the peak of pollution caused by humans

“If you smoke, please don’t leave your (cigarette) butts behind.”

This was the caption Karen Mason included with a devastating picture that serves as another painful reminder of how bad pollution is.

Karen is a volunteer at the National Audubon Society, an environmental NGO that dedicates to the protection and conservation of birds. She recently captured a photograph of a mother skimmer feeding its baby at a beach in Florida.

However, instead of worms, the mother had a cigarette butt secured in her bright orange beak. She passed it over to the baby skimmer, which carefully took it in its small mouth. If this doesn’t break your heart, maybe you should do something about it.

She then shared another follow-up picture that shows the baby bird flapping its adorable wings as a sign of excitement upon getting the cigarette butt. The poor thing thought it was food.

“It’s time we cleaned up our beaches and stopped treating them like a giant ashtray,” wrote Karen. The truth is, animals are running out of food to eat and places to live because of the selfish acts of humans.

We feel entitled to our surroundings and do things without realizing that we are abusing the natural resources and depriving other living beings of their basic needs. This is not the first picture proof of how bad we have turned life for animals.

A dead stingray’s stomach was found to be filled up with a pack of cigarettes, a bottle, a book, and even a camera!

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We really didn’t wanna share this but at the end we decided that it’s good for all of us to see what a marine animal can ingest in this vast blue ocean ?WE SEE A BOOK ? A CAMERA ? A PACK OF CIGARETTES ? WHAT ELSE DO YOU SEE?? Write below ?? . . . please ?? friends on Instagram BE CAREFUL AND WATCH YOUR HABITS and how you dispose your trash – please share ! so other are informed and awaken about this serious problem we are facing. . . . #Repost @interseccionalidad ・・・ Definitivamente NO TE VAS A CREER lo que aparece dentro de una manta marina. Es absolutamente desolador. Y ésto en un animal que apenas tiene anchura, imaginaros toda la mierda que tienen que tener en sus tripas los que son de más tamaño. Y de ésto sólo hay un responsable y somos cada una de nosotras. La respuesta no es "reciclar", reciclar no evita esto, reducir es lo que lo evita. Si aún no te has planteado reducir el plástico que consumes, es buen momento para hacerlo. Podemos dejar de comprar en envases innecesarios y pensar siempre si podemos sustituirlo por productos que apuesten por envolverse en papel, acero inoxidable, cristal, metal, o directamente intentar comprar a granel con nuestros envases… Realmente lo que se ha hecho toda la vida. Hay mucha gente que está dando cuenta de ello: @vivirsinplastico, @ecoblognonoa, @marianamatija, @usaryreusar, @laecocosmopolita, @reinasyrepollos, @cuidomiplaneta. Lo mismo para este consumismo abrumador que nos abstrae, NO SE NECESITA TANTO, por favor. Decrecimiento, consumo consciente, simple y básico. #mardeplastico #mar #sea #manta #plastico #plastic #basura #rush #contaminacion #medioambiente #enviroment #tierra #cuidados #eco #animal #animals #ocean #oceano #vegan #decrecimiento #consumirmenos

A post shared by 5MinuteBeachCleanup Foundation (@5minutebeachcleanup) on Apr 5, 2019 at 9:57am PDT

In another news, a seahorse was photographed to have a cotton swab stuck to its tail.

This is not photoshopped.

Seahorses clutch drifting seagrass, or other natural debris to ride currents.

In the polluted waters of the Indonesian island of Sumbawa, this seahorse latched onto a plastic cotton bud.

“A photo I wish didn’t exist”, says photographer Justin Hofman. pic.twitter.com/Zg0bUTPED0

— helen ayres (@Raphaelite_Girl) June 5, 2018

Not to forget the heartbreaking video of a turtle screaming in pain as a plastic straw is removed from its nostrils.

These are just a small fraction of a bigger problem we humans have contributed to pollution. Share this news and act now!