On the other hand, you might consider that nature is cleaning the garbage patch.
We've given up on being able to clean the garbage patch saying its impractical to go out there and fish such widely dispersed trash from the ocean. By this, of course, we mean "too expensive".
Nature has dispatched the cleaning crew to do it for us at an almost unimaginable cost. The albatross seems an almost perfect instrument for flying out there, spotting, and picking up exactly as much trash as it can carry and then returning it to land.
Hopefully the selection pressure you speak of will yield a method of collection that doesn't cost a whole bird for each load.
We've given up on being able to clean the garbage patch saying its impractical to go out there and fish such widely dispersed trash from the ocean. By this, of course, we mean "too expensive".
Nature has dispatched the cleaning crew to do it for us at an almost unimaginable cost. The albatross seems an almost perfect instrument for flying out there, spotting, and picking up exactly as much trash as it can carry and then returning it to land.
Hopefully the selection pressure you speak of will yield a method of collection that doesn't cost a whole bird for each load.