✨ BIOLUMINESCENT PLANKTON ✨

Here you can see dinoflagellates, which are plankton with characteristics of both animals and plants, washing up on a beach and glowing!

This blue glow is a result of the dinoflagellates being bioluminescent! These critters use this to startle predators and scientists have noted that through doing so it reduces the amount of dinoflagellates eaten by said predators!

It also acts as a sort of “burglar alarm” to attract a secondary predator that threatens to eat the predator that is eating the dinoflagellates!

Seeing these critters wash up on the beach in considerable numbers is quite rare and unpredictable!

National Geographic