Plastic enters the nest not as a deliberate invention, but as an available material already circulating through the environments birds inhabit. Nets, ropes, twine and plastic fragments arrive through fishing activity, household waste, tidal movement and everyday coastal life.

What once appeared as an unusual trace is now increasingly visible across coastal nesting sites. In this changing material landscape, plastic is no longer simply debris on the shore. It becomes part of what a bird can find, pick up, and potentially build with.

Field observations recorded in Findhorn and Burghead show nests composed almost entirely of plastic-based materials. In both locations, human-made materials now make up a significant part of the surrounding nesting environment, shaped by proximity to settlement, harbour activity, and long-term coexistence between birds and human infrastructure.

By contrast, a comparative nest documented near the residential edge of Troup Head RSPB still contains a noticeably lower proportion of plastic, where natural cliff-based materials remain more available.