I read once that the same currents that create patterns of ocean ice in my previous post sometimes become rich with swirls of algae in the summer, leading me down a hunt for imagery of a bloom.
After trying other locations, such as the Great Lakes and the Bay of Biscay, I found that the Baltic Sea has become a breeding ground for algae blooms, given the mixing of cold and nutrient rich waters during the spring and summer. This July image shows one of these blooms, although I am unable to identify whether it is cyanobacteria (blue-green, late summer) or phytoplankton (springtime), or a mix of both.
If you look really close in the second image, you will see small lines streaking diagonally from the top right. These are boat paths, and if you zoom in enough, you may find a boat to give an idea of the immense scale of this bloom. This image was taken to the east of the island of Gotland (Sweden) and west of Saaremaa (Estonia—translates as “isle land”).
Read about how researchers are using satellites to monitor these increasingly frequent blooms here.
Satellite imagery from ESA’s Copernicus program. CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO.