![]() ![]() The photographs, taken between 20, appear in Brandt's new book Across the Ravaged Land. So he believes the birds and bats were confused by the sky's reflection in the lake and killed when they hit the water.The animals probably aren't truly calcified, but are coated with sodium carbonate or sodium bicarbonate, said Cerling, who has researched the chemistry of Africa's Rift Valley lakes."There is almost no calcium in the lake, although the inflowing fresh waters have calcium, which precipitates as it mixes with the high-pH alkaline waters of the lake."-Liz LangleyĪ "calcified" swallow sings in stony silence along northern Tanzania's Lake Natron (map), which contains so much soda and salt that it would "strip the ink of my Kodak film boxes in a few seconds," according to photographer Nick Brandt.īrandt unexpectedly found the dead animals that had washed up on the shore, preserved by the lake, and posed them as they had been in life. Since there are few predators in the area, their bodies remain and become salt-encrusted when the lake's water level drops.However, Brandt said that many people in the region have seen birds crash-land into the water. (Also see "Pictures: Best Wild Animal Photos of 2012 Announced.")Lake Natron's unusually harsh composition comes from a unique neighboring volcano, Ol Doinyo, which spews alkali-rich natrocarbonatites that end up in Lake Natron via rainwater runoff.Thure Cerling, professor of geology and geophysics at the University of Utah, said by email that the animals in Brandt's photographs likely died of natural causes. As isolated as the lake is (it wasn’t even discovered by Europeans until 1954), there are no protections in place for the lake or its threatened flamingo population.A "calcified" swallow sings in stony silence along northern Tanzania's Lake Natron (map), which contains so much soda and salt that it would "strip the ink of my Kodak film boxes in a few seconds," according to photographer Nick Brandt.Brandt unexpectedly found the dead animals that had washed up on the shore, preserved by the lake, and posed them as they had been in life. The serenity of Lake Natron - and its flamingo population - are threatened by a proposed hydroelectric power plant on the Ewaso Ngiro River, the main river feeding the lake. As shallow lakes in a hot climate, their water temperatures can reach as high as 106 degrees Fahrenheit (41 degrees Celsius). Both are terminal lakes that do not drain out to any river or sea they are fed by hot springs and small rivers. ![]() Lake Natron is one of two alkaline lakes in that area of East Africa the other is Lake Bahi. The flamingos’ nests are built on small islands that form in the lake during the dry season. “Reanimated, alive again in death.”ĭuring breeding season, more than 2 million lesser flamingos ( Phoenicopterus minor) use the shallow lake as their primary breeding ground in Africa. “I took these creatures as I found them on the shoreline, and then placed them in ‘living’ positions, bringing them back to ‘life,’ as it were,” Brandt wrote, referring to the way he repositioned the animals. “No one knows for certain exactly how they die, but … the water has an extremely high soda and salt content, so high that it would strip the ink off my Kodak film boxes within a few seconds.” “I unexpectedly found the creatures - all manner of birds and bats - washed up along the shoreline of Lake Natron,” Brandt wrote in his book. īrandt discovered the remains of flamingos and other animals with chalky sodium carbonate deposits outlining their bodies in sharp relief. Now, photographer Nick Brandt has captured haunting images of the lake and its dead in a book titled “Across the Ravaged Land” (Abrams Books, 2013). In fact, Lake Natron’s alkaline waters support a thriving ecosystem of salt marshes, freshwater wetlands, flamingos and other wetland birds, tilapia and the algae on which large flocks of flamingos feed. And deposits of sodium carbonate - which was once used in Egyptian mummification - also acts as a fantastic type of preservative for those animals unlucky enough to die in the waters of Lake Natron.ĭespite some media reports, the animal didn’t simply turn to stone and die after coming into contact with the lake’s water. The water’s alkalinity comes from the sodium carbonate and other minerals that flow into the lake from the surrounding hills. The alkaline water in Lake Natron has a pH as high as 10.5 and is so caustic it can burn the skin and eyes of animals that aren’t adapted to it. Lake Natron in Tanzania is one of the most serene lakes in Africa, but it’s also the source of some of the most phantasmagorical photographs ever captured - images that look as though living animals had instantly turned to stone. ![]()
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