At sea, Canary Islands to Cape Verde
As the sun rose over the Atlantic Ocean, the naturalists were on the bridge to greet the day. Within minutes of the first rays of light illuminating the waves it was clear that something unusual was happening. On the surface of the sea, in all directions, were hundreds, no, thousands of small pink...things. Were they shrimp? As the Underwater Specialist was scrambling with a plankton net, the other naturalists raised binoculars and realised that we were looking at – locusts.
These insects had clearly flown wind-blown from the coast of Africa, some 300 nautical miles to the east. As they ran out of energy and settled on the ocean they died. Throughout the day their corpses littered the waters we steamed through. Rough estimates and calculations produced figures in the region of 20,000 locusts per square kilometre of ocean. And during the hours of daylight we covered some 260 kilometres. We have no way of knowing how the size and shape of the insect slick was, but there is little doubt that millions of locusts met their end here.
Other wildlife today seemed to relate to the locusts. We saw flying fish, but no, we did not see them eating the dead locusts. Six species of seabird, but none of them seemed interested either. The few dolphins and beaked whales were likewise disinterested. So this abundant resource was going seemingly to waste, but no doubt some decomposers somewhere will be glad of this vast input of nutrients.
As the sun rose over the Atlantic Ocean, the naturalists were on the bridge to greet the day. Within minutes of the first rays of light illuminating the waves it was clear that something unusual was happening. On the surface of the sea, in all directions, were hundreds, no, thousands of small pink...things. Were they shrimp? As the Underwater Specialist was scrambling with a plankton net, the other naturalists raised binoculars and realised that we were looking at – locusts.
These insects had clearly flown wind-blown from the coast of Africa, some 300 nautical miles to the east. As they ran out of energy and settled on the ocean they died. Throughout the day their corpses littered the waters we steamed through. Rough estimates and calculations produced figures in the region of 20,000 locusts per square kilometre of ocean. And during the hours of daylight we covered some 260 kilometres. We have no way of knowing how the size and shape of the insect slick was, but there is little doubt that millions of locusts met their end here.
Other wildlife today seemed to relate to the locusts. We saw flying fish, but no, we did not see them eating the dead locusts. Six species of seabird, but none of them seemed interested either. The few dolphins and beaked whales were likewise disinterested. So this abundant resource was going seemingly to waste, but no doubt some decomposers somewhere will be glad of this vast input of nutrients.
