Black sand. Sandy beaches: red, white, yellow

2024 Author: Harold Hamphrey | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:06

Most often, when a person imagines summer, he has the following associations: the sea, the sun, the beach and hot yellow sand. So soft, golden or orange, red, black, or maybe green? Colorful and unique, they are located all over the world, and some of them are truly incredible.

Beaches in all colors of the rainbow

Picturesque and colorful sandy beaches can be found in many parts of the world. According to the Guinness Book of Records, the whitest sand in the world is found in Australia. Golden beaches can be found in Manduria (Italy). The individual color of each grain is influenced by minerals, composition of rocks, plants and even animals that live in the area. The same beach can look more yellow, gold, brown, or bright orange, depending on the time of day, the sun, and the weather.

The most beautiful and unusual beaches

The pink sands of the beach on Harbor Island (Bahamas) look very unusual. Located on the east side of the island, they have this shade due tored shells of unicellular marine animals mixed with white sand. The green beach of Papacolea in Hawaii or the coast of Floreana Island (Galapagos Islands) looks very harmonious. If you carefully examine a handful of such sand, you can see a huge amount of vitreous olive-colored crystals, they make up most of the sand, as they are washed out of local rocks.

In Puerto Rico, on the island of Vieques, the red sand on the beach surprises with its beauty and unusualness. A real hidden treasure of nature is Kaihalulu Beach on the island of Maui (Hawaii). Here you can also see dark red sand. Local rocks are rich in iron, which is the reason for such a rich shade. Getting here is not easy, as this picturesque place is extremely isolated and difficult to access.

What is sand?

Sand is a free-flowing granular material that covers the beaches, riverbeds and deserts of the world. It is made up of different materials that differ depending on the location. The most common component of sand is silica in the form of quartz, as well as rocks and minerals such as feldspar and mica. Due to weathering processes (wind, rain, thawing, freezing), all these rocks and minerals are gradually crushed and turned into small grains.

Tropical islands like Hawaii don't have rich sources of quartz, so the sand is different in those places. He can bewhite due to the presence of calcium carbonate obtained from the shells and skeletons of marine organisms. Tropical beaches can also have black sand, which is made up of dark volcanic glass. Surprisingly little is known about the origin of sand in the world's largest deserts. Research shows that the Sahara was once a lush desert before climate change turned it into a desert.

Such different sand

Why is the color of sand so different in different parts of the world? Nature never ceases to amaze everyone with its diversity, including also extremely colorful sandy beaches, painted with iridescent hues: green, red, orange, pink, purple, brown, golden yellow and white. Some beaches have black sand. So what is causing the difference? The answer lies in the depths of the geology of the entire coastline. Sand is fragments of rocks and minerals such as quartz and iron, ranging in size from 63 microns (one thousandth of a millimeter) to two millimeters.

Sand in terms of geology

The geology of the surrounding areas greatly affects the composition and color of the sand. For example, on the coast, consisting of rocks that arose by volcanic eruptions (granites), the sand will be lighter. If, however, most of the coast contains metamorphic rocks that have undergone folding and mixing with other rocks, which allowed them to increase the amount of oxides such as iron, thenthe shades will be much richer.

When various rocks break down into grains that make up the sand on the beach, their color is mainly determined by the presence or absence of iron, a very common mineral on Earth. When iron minerals are exposed to air, they begin to oxidize, producing red, orange, or yellow sand. Sometimes the color depends not only on geological rocks. It is affected by organisms living in the water. Some beaches are made up of tiny pieces of coral and the skeletal remains of marine creatures such as mollusks, crustaceans and foraminifera, which give the sand a pearly white hue.

The creation and color of the beach

Beaches can form anywhere the sea or ocean cuts into the mainland. Over the millennia, waves have eroded coastlines, creating flat spaces called beaches. These new expanses begin to accumulate sediments falling down from the surrounding hills, as well as eroded, remnants of soil thrown out by waves from the ocean floor. Coastal winds and storms are also involved in creating beaches. The color of the sand at a particular location usually reflects the surrounding landscape and the hues of the adjacent ocean floor.

Due to its unique geology, Hawaii has a number of colorful beaches that you will not find anywhere else in the world. For example, the coal-black sand of Punaluu Beach is the result of volcanic activity. It includes crumbs of bas alt and is considered the mostblack in the world. The white sand of Hyams Beach is called the whitest and cleanest in the world. It is so crushed that it resembles powdered sugar. Located on the Hawaiian island of Maui, Kaihalulu Beach is famous for being one of the few places in the world with iron-rich red sand.

Is black sand beach rare or common?

The most unusual beaches are black sand, which is simply a stunning result of volcanic activity near the coast. Black sand can be seen on top of quartz in regions of high terrestrial activity, on the slopes of volcanoes, and in areas where most rocks are dark in color and poor in silica. Most of them are rich in iron, and by weight this sand is heavier than ordinary quartz. Why is the sand black? It may consist of a certain number of different dark minerals of a volcanic nature.

Places where there is a black sand beach are often the source of deposits of gems such as garnets, rubies, sapphires, topazes and, of course, diamonds, which form in the vicinity of volcanoes and can erupt outward along with lava flows. Black sand beaches can be found in Argentina, South Pacific, Tahiti, Philippines, California, Greece, Antilles, Hawaii.

The world is full of beautiful beaches, there is no doubt about it. And although most people would happily agree to soak up the bright sun, lying on the white or golden sand, it is still worth paying attention to others.beaches, with sands of other colors of the rainbow.