Anybody got phytoplankton right now?

[bennedc]

The hubby was asking me earlier if I thought any parts of this great planet have phytoplankton in season right now. I decided to pass that on to ya'll to find out. He is fascinated with those critters! They are pretty cool. We saw them off of Puerto Aventuras in March, 2001.

So, does anyone know where, if any place, phytoplankton is active right now? Any in the Bahamas?

 

[SchoonCR]

I see it, in varying degrees, on all of our Key's training trips.

Saw them just this past trip on our night dives on Christ of the Deep in Largo. Not great, but they were there.

Some of the best I have seen was last November in Panama City, off the Bart.

 

[Tom Smedley]

I started taking a magnifying glass for my safety stops so I can get up close to the creatures that drift along. Once saw things that looked like tiny transistors that turned out to be small octopi. I think maybe what you are talking about are the dinoflagellate Noctaluca (which is also the name of a rock band). I did a night dive in Panama City three weekends ago and got quite a show. The best show was in Bathala Maldives where a diver's silhouette glowed as they swam. Once I was on a ferry in the Philippines - where I was going does not matter - We drank San Miguel one after another all day. The toilet - it turned out - flushed with seawater. I went in sometime after dark for a much needed moment of relief. There was no light in the bathroom so as my relief started the whole toilet glowed bright green. I thought I had killed my kidneys. Rick Murchison has an even more interesting story concerning his family beach home and Noctaluca. Maybe he'll relate it to us.

 

[bennedc]

I started taking a magnifying glass for my safety stops so I can get up close to the creatures that drift along. Once saw things that looked like tiny transistors that turned out to be small octopi. I think maybe what you are talking about are the dinoflagellate Noctaluca (which is also the name of a rock band). I did a night dive in Panama City three weekends ago and got quite a show. The best show was in Bathala Maldives where a diver's silhouette glowed as they swam. Once I was on a ferry in the Philippines - where I was going does not matter - We drank San Miguel one after another all day. The toilet - it turned out - flushed with seawater. I went in sometime after dark for a much needed moment of relief. There was no light in the bathroom so as my relief started the whole toilet glowed bright green. I thought I had killed my kidneys. Rick Murchison has an even more interesting story concerning his family beach home and Noctaluca. Maybe he'll relate it to us.

Too wierd! That's cool! What 'cha got, Rick?

 

[David P]

I have some phytoplankton in my fridge, I feed it to my corals and clams some times. Phytoplankton is mostly single cell green algae. Perhaps you mean Zooplankton? Slightly larger crustacian looking like micro shrimp? I have that quite active in my refugium...

 

[bennedc]

Maybe I misnamed them...I'm talking about the bioluminescent plankton that glows green in the water when you stirr your fins around and stuff...

You know, like fireflies of the microscopic world...

 

[MarkH]

Maybe I misnamed them...I'm talking about the bioluminescent plankton that glows green in the water when you stirr your fins around and stuff...

You know, like fireflies of the microscopic world...

That's zooplankton and we have tons of it up here. Most divers think there is too much. Look anywhere with cold water (more oxygen). All the larvae is going nuts right now (late spring). A few weeks ago "stuff" was spewing out of all the seastars, anemones, sponges, etc.

 

[archman]

Phytoplankton is traditionally rich in coastal waters, and in non-tropical latitudes, except when ice-covered. Higher latitude ocean waters experience much greater vertical water mass mixing than the tropics/subtropics, which facilitates nutrient exchange.

The tropics and subtropics, as a general rule, are plankton-poor. That's why the water's so clear. That, and the coarse sediments.

The "bioluminescent stuff" is usually a dinophyte, which is an alga. Noctiluca (spelled this way, not the other way) is a large-bodied, non-photosynthetic genus that glows rather well. Dinophyte bioluminescence is usually green-colored. Zooplanktonic bioluminescence tends to reflect blue wavelengths in most cases.

 

[Rick Murchison]

The plants & critters in the plankton that light up when disturbed can sometimes get so thick that they are of "military significance." When cruising the IO on carriers we would not infrequently encounter blooms of bioluminescence so bright that you could feel your eyes adjusting when you looked at the ship's wake much like walking into the sunshine from a movie theater. When the wake was that bright it could be seen for over a hundred miles from an airplane, even further from a satellite, and we'd have to send an OPREP back to DC to that effect.
--
Our place on Perdido Bay was built from heart (longleaf) pine in 1910. The lumber was barged in from a sawmill up the bay, so there are some boards in it that are "tree-length." During its construction a fast moving tropical storm hit one night - big winds but in this case little rain at the construction site. The story goes that the contractor rushed down to check on the house as soon as the winds dropped enough for him to get in there, and he found that the wind was whipping so much spray off the bay - that happened to be filled with bioluminescence that night - onto the just framed house that the timbers were all aglow in the dark; a ghostly half-built house standing clearly in the pitch dark night.
The name of the place is "Witchwood."
Rick

 

[DavidPT40]

Why does it light up when its disturbed?