Ocean Color Image Gallery

Winter Blooms in the Black Sea

It's the middle of winter and snow covers the mountains north and south of the eastern Black Sea. Nonetheless, phytoplankton appear to be blooming in the surface waters of that deep landlocked sea. The brightest feature in the above image has the appearance of a coccolithophore bloom. That calcite-shedding protist is more commonly found blooming in this region during the summertime.

The above image was collected by Landsat 8 on February 4, 2019. Click on it to get a larger version.