NASA has a brilliant feed I subscribe to over at their Earth Observatory that provides
regular updates from a couple of their imaging satellites.
The below image is courtesy of the Terra – MODIS satellite,
and looks so cool that I thought I would share it with you all.
It depicts an eddy
off the tip of South Africa that has stirred up a bevy of nutrients from
the ocean floor, and precipitated a large phytoplankton bloom. This
is the brilliant swirl of discolouration that stands out from the rest of the
ocean surface.
It’s amazing to see these massive phenomena and then realise
that they are caused by some of the world’s smallest plants. To get a bit of
perspective, if this bloom was superimposed over Victoria, it would cover
Ballarat, Geelong and most of Melbourne! Pretty impressive for something
comprised of individuals, that aren’t even visible with the naked eye.
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| Note: this is not the plankton I am referring to here; these guys are plants, and the food of zooplankton like the Plankton pictured above |
These mini plant factories are prodigious little things too,
and are responsible for half of all the oxygen generated by plant life on
planet earth; so we should be thankful such blooms are common occurrences.
For a bit more perspective, here is the full image from the
site, showing its position off the coast of Africa, and for those of you who
know your geography; it will also give an example of the scale of the thing.
Pretty awesome stuff.
MM
P.s. I must dedicate this post to my wonderful wife, who insisted that I use the above title after I jokingly mentioned it.
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