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Videographers have captured incredible footage of one of the largest tidal salad days of glowing algae ever record in Southern California .
The dazzling sea ignitor show , which appear off the coast of San Diego , is have in " San Diego : America ’s Wildest City , " an episode from the Emmy and Peabody - winning PBS series " Nature . " The weak show was produced by single - cell being called dinoflagellate , which bring forth an aery glow known asbioluminescencethrough an inner chemical substance reaction .
The natural phenomenon of bioluminescence transforms the waters of San Diego into a breathtaking light display.
" When push by movement , the dinoflagellate emit shining blue light source that startles would - be predators,“Nate Dappen , writer and director of the sequence , recount Live Science in an e-mail . " When the numbers are high enough , every go down wave glows risque as billions of cell bioluminesce at the same meter in the churn of the surf . "
In the fountain of 2020 , San Diego experienced a period of heavy rain which take to a substantial algal bloom . The rain settles on the ocean ’s surface , make a separate layer from the deeper water supply . This detachment trammel nutrients take up by a tempest near the airfoil , create the consummate conditions for phytoplankton to flourish .
research worker recorded the highest number ofLingulodinium polyedramat Scripps Pier in California , at approximately 2.4 million mobile phone per gallon ( 9 million electric cell per liter ) , grant to theSouthern California Coastal Ocean Observing System . The mellow compactness of cellsturned the ocean a reddish brownduring the day — do it as a " red tide . "
Videographers capture incredible footage of one of the largest tidal blooms in the new episode, “San Diego: America’s Wildest City."
" In 2020 , San Diego saw the prominent red tide since 1900 . It was unreal , " Dappen said . " For about a hebdomad the coast was exploding with light every dark . That happened to also be the year that we started developing this show . "
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Satellite images show the phytoplankton bloom stretched from Los Angeles to Baja California , Mexico . But the phytoplankton ' brightness is for the most part dependent on serene sea conditions , make ideal viewing hard to predict .
" Our team work with two local gifted movie maker named Alex Nye and Patrick Coyne who spend many farseeing nights on the coast search for complete conditions to film , " Dappen enunciate .
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The team also worked with wildlife filmmaker Alex Wiles to record bioluminescent algae under a microscope , which proved to be a challenge . " At that tiny scale , any apparent movement made the footage too shaky , " Dappen said .
Even the slightest apparent movement of the plankton would trigger bioluminescence but the cells appear out of focus . " fortunately , Alex work out out a style to shift them without moving them , by adding several sum to the urine they were in , " Dappen said .
The episode also boast extremely rare footage of San Diego ’s other unique wildlife . " Across the show , we made many discovery . In fact , several of the sequences were not planned , " includingorcas(Orcinus orca ) hunting dolphin and a glimpse at the raw population of crows in San Diego , Dappen enjoin .
" San Diego : America ’s Wildest City " air on PBS on Wednesday , Nov. 6 . For times , see to it local listings . It will also be available atpbs.org/natureand thePBS app . Select episodes will be available to stream on theNature YouTube channel .
