What Goes Up Must Come Down

A balloon release is great for weddings, graduations, prayer ceremony, or to raise awareness of a cause, but balloons can pose a threat to many animals.

It may seem harmless, but balloons do not go away once they float into the sky and they pose a threat to birds, turtles and other animals that commonly mistake balloons for food.

Strings and ribbons wrap around birds and bird wings. Tangled birds become helpless and more likely to die as they are hunted. Some just weaken and die, trapped and unable to free themselves. Many animals might eat a balloon floating in the ocean or lake thinking it is food.

Balloons do not go away once they float into the sky. They come to the ground, sometimes in forests, sometimes in ponds, sometimes in fields and sometimes they float so high they come down in the ocean.

 

Chinese lanterns, also known as sky lanterns have really been gaining popularity over the last couple of years.  They work in much the same way as large hot air balloons, in that the flame heats the air inside the lantern, lowering its density and causing it to rise. When the fuel is gone, what is left of the lantern sinks back to the ground, along with the thin wire frame used to support the paper.

As lantern popularity has spread across the world, so have the accidents.  They cause fires by and the wires left behind are often ingested by wildlife and causes harm.

Making the decision to release litter into the environment is clearly not a good choice, regardless of the reason why. Letting a balloon go is the same as throwing garbage onto the roadside – littering is littering. Don’t do it and you’ll be saving wildlife from a slow, unnecessary death!

Environmentally Friendly Alternatives