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COLD OPEN DELUXE ✦ Nº 05 / 20
The Lake That Turns Animals to Stone
A caustic red lake in Tanzania preserves dead animals as eerie calcified statues.
Wikimedia Commons · Yonas Kidane · CC BY-SA 2.0
LAKE NATRON, TANZANIA
A lake the color of blood
From above, Lake Natron glows deep red and orange. The color comes from salt-loving microbes thriving in water so alkaline and salty that most living things can't survive it at all.
Wikimedia Commons · Yonas Kidane · CC BY-SA 2.0
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THE CHEMISTRY
pH 10+
CAUSTIC ENOUGH TO BURN SKIN AND EYES
Basically liquid cleaning solution
The lake's water can reach a pH as high as about 10.5 — closer to ammonia or bleach than to normal water. It's fed by mineral-rich volcanic springs, and it bakes in intense heat.
THE STONE ANIMALS
Preserved, mid-pose
Photographer Nick Brandt found dead birds and bats around the lake, calcified by its chemistry into haunting, statue-like forms — some looking almost alive, frozen exactly as they died.
Wikimedia Commons · Richard Mortel from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia · CC BY 2.0
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THE MYTH-CORRECTION
It doesn't turn animals to stone on contact.
The lake doesn't 'petrify' living animals instantly like a legend. Instead, its high salt and soda chemistry preserves and coats bodies of animals that die there — a slower, stranger kind of mummification.
THE TWIST
Deadly to most — perfect for a few
The same lake that kills is a nursery for one famous bird.
TOO HARSH
Lethal to most animals and plants
JUST RIGHT
Millions of flamingos breed here
THE REASON
Predators can't cross the caustic water
THE COLOR
Flamingos even get their pink from the microbes
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THE POINT
The deadliest place around is the safest place for a flamingo.
What makes Lake Natron lethal to almost everything is exactly what makes it a fortress for the creatures adapted to it. 'Hostile' depends entirely on who you are.
THE RECEIPTS · THIS REALLY HAPPENED
Look it up yourself
PLACE
Lake Natron, northern Tanzania
THE WATER
Extremely salty and alkaline (pH up to ~10.5)
THE COLOR
Red/orange from salt-loving microbes
THE 'STONE' ANIMALS
Bodies calcified by the chemistry
PHOTOGRAPHED BY
Nick Brandt
THE LIFE
A major flamingo breeding site
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DISCUSS
What do you think?
How can the most hostile place be the safest home for something?
Why do we find preserved, lifelike bodies so unsettling?
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