Episode Summary: This episode is focused on a discussion about the problem of plastic recycling. It is selected from episode 13 (The Octopus’ Gardens) 

Tonya, Kristy, and Katherine wrote the script for "Why is there so much plastic in the ocean? How did it get there?" - a special feature of our kids' podcast, Generation Carbon. 

In their exploration, they uncover how human actions, often unintentional, not only pose threats to our oceans but also jeopardise marine life, including the enigmatic octopuses.

To listen to the full episode of Octopus’ Gardens go here

To listen to the kids’ episode of  "Why is there so much plastic in the ocean? How did it get there?" go here

For more information on the project and to order your copy of the Carbon Almanac, visit thecarbonalmanac.org

Want to join in the conversation?

Visit thecarbonalmanac.org/podcasts and send us a voice message on this episode or any other climate-related ideas and perspectives.

Don’t Take Our Word For It, Look It Up!

You can find out more on page 78, 79 and 162 of the Carbon Almanac and on the website you can tap the footnotes link and type in 027, 346 and 256

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Featuring Carbon Almanac Contributors Tonya Downing, Kristy Sharrow, and Katherine Palmer.

Tonya is from Durham in North Carolina, she is involved in Personality-driven digital marketing for small businesses in the US. 

Kristy is a journalist turned marketer and Katherine is an Aromatherapist and Workshop Coordinator.

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The CarbonSessions Podcast is produced and edited by Leekei Tang, Steve Heatherington and Rob Slater.

, and just started sharing

all of this stuff and it.

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It was really fascinating to learn

both about the octopus, which was what

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we decided to center the story on.

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But then also in parallel to that,

learning about ocean plastics and.

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That whole side of things

was very eye opening too.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Super eye opening.

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Like some of the things that I've learned

about ocean plastics, the great Pacific

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plastic patch, you know, that huge mound

of plastic that's just floating out there.

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That's bigger than Texas like that just.

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Blew my mind that that's real.

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And I guess there's one in the Atlantic

too, that rivals the Pacific one in size.

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And it just, you realize all

the creatures that it affects,

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like the octopus and I heard OC

occupy are really smart creatures.

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Actually, they really are.

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They actually have the IQ and capacity

of like a two year old human child

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or like a dog, the trainability of a.

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So they're really fascinating creatures.

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They're mischievous.

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They can like, they keep track of

people that have wronged them, or

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like, there's this story of an octopus

in an aquarium where one of the

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trainers or the workers, it didn't

like this worker for whatever reason.

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So every time the worker would

turn his or her back to walk

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away, it would spit water at it.

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It was truly upset with this

worker and doing it on purpose.

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They found.

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So yeah, Actify are, are

super fascinating creatures.

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And like one of the many creatures

under the ocean that are so smart,

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like we look at, you know, dolphins

and whales and all these even sharks

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are finding how this intelligence

that we never give them credit for.

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It's just makes me really sad how we.

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You know, polluting their

home so that they're, they're

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not even standing a chance.

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Yeah, I completely agree.

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I think that was one of the eye-opening

pieces of knowledge that I learned

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throughout creating this script.

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Once we decided to choose an activist as

our main character, which we chose because

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of some of the things Tanya mentioned of

it being mischievous and smart, and we

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just thought it would be a fun character.

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We were looking at where.

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This octopus should live.

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And I don't know where an

octopus would typically live.

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I don't know much about it.

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So I started doing research and it

did not take long to learn that many

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are living in human trash right now.

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And.

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There are a lot of pictures of it, a

lot of information on it, but with human

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trash becoming increasingly common in the

ocean, sometimes it's easier to find than

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something like a seashell for a home.

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So, Tanya, I don't know if you knew

that before, but I know for me that was.

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that was a big moment to,

to learn more about that.

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No, absolutely.

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It was eye opening and we, I think we

kind of jokingly were feeling really bad

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about collecting seashells and stuff.

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Um, because we learned that that's an

actual problem for octopus, that they

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sometimes will wear like shells to

cover themselves or protect themselves.

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And they're not able to find.

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Them as much anymore.

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So they'll, they've started using ocean

plastics and coffee hands and, and

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things that are, that make their way

from landfills to the bottom of the sea.

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So it's very sad.

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Yeah.

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And then on top of those potentially

harming them, like there was one

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picture that I remember from the

beginning of our research where

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an octopus was living inside of a.

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Piece of broken glass.

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So on top of something like that,

potentially hurting them, some of the

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ocean plastics can be leaking chemicals

that are harmful for them as well.

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So was it hard to write it

so that it relates to kids?

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Like this is such a huge problem

and it feels really daunting.

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Like all these, all this plastic in

the oceans, like how is it to write

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something that would relate to.