How does pollution get to the Arctic? Bird poo, that's how!

This article is probably of interest only to a narrow range of my "audience", but I found it interesting. Not because it's about bird poop, obviously, but because here is another example of the amazing complexity and interconnectedness of life. Well, it also tickles my darker sense of humour a bit, I guess:

Bird droppings are a major route used to spread chemical contaminants such as mercury and DDT to the High Arctic, Canadian researchers have found.

Scientists had assumed winds were the main way that the chemicals spread.

...

The contaminants are washed into the ocean, where the birds feast on fish and then return to the Arctic to feed their young.

When the birds return north, the contaminants they've accumulated are released on land in a "boomerang effect," said the study's lead author, Jules Blais, a professor of environmental toxicology of the University of Ottawa.