'Smoking' bird: Mother skimmer feeding cigarette butt to chick sparks outrage over littering on beaches

The mother skimmer offered a cigarette butt to its chick at St Pete's Beach in Pinellas County. (Image Courtesy: Karen Mason)  |  Photo Credit: Facebook

Florida: A mother bird was spotted feeding a cigarette butt to her baby at a beach in Florida. The heartbreaking moment where a black skimmer offered the cigarette butt to its chick was captured by Largo resident Karen Mason at St Pete's Beach in Pinellas County.

The photos of the baby chick holding the cigarette butt in its beak have called for a crackdown on littering at the beaches.

"I happened to see an adult giving a chick something. I knew it wasn’t a fish, but I couldn’t tell what it was," Mason told local media. She did not realise that it was a cigarette butt until she got back home to view the picture on her computer screen.

Take a look:

She wrote, "If you smoke, please don’t leave your butts behind," while sharing the photo in which the mother fed its chick the butt of a cigarette.

Mason posted another photo of the baby skimmer with the cigarette butt with the caption, "This Skimmer chick was offered a cigarette butt by its parent. It’s time we cleaned up our beaches and stopped treating them like one giant ashtray."

Since the pictures were shared, they have caused outrage among netizens. The photos, now viral, have been flooded with comments. Here are some of the reactions:

A user wrote, "Sad. We must learn to treat our earth like the treasure it is!" Another said, "Absolutely disheartening."

A third user commented, "This doesn't just hurt our animals and environment, it can create forest fires as well. Very powerful picture message right here folks."

Yet another wrote, "This is a preventable tragedy. Thanks for taking this photo and helping to spread awareness of this issue."

According to a 2018 report from the Ocean Conservancy, cigarette butts topped the list of 10 trash items collected from beaches globally.