Smokers around the world buy roughly 6.5 trillion cigarettes each year. That’s 18 billion every day. A recent study found that cigarette butts  inhibit plant grwoth. They also routinely get into waterways, and eventually oceans. Cigarette butts have long been at the top or near the list of items organizations find when cleaning beaches. The extra billions that remain in the water are dangerous for marine animals, which can eat them.
Because they look so much more like a bite of food on the surface of the sea.