US rivers are changing from blue to yellow and green, satellite images show:
A third of U.S. rivers have significantly changed color over the last 36 years, turning from blue to yellow and green, striking new images reveal.
Researchers analyzed 235,000 satellite images — taken over a 34-year period between 1984 and 2018 — from NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) Landsat program. The changing hues can be viewed in an interactive map.
More than half of those satellite images showed rivers with a dominant hue of yellow, while more than a third of images were mostly green. Just 8% of river pics were mostly blue.
"Most of the rivers are changing gradually and not noticeable to the human eye," lead author John Gardner, a postdoctoral researcher in the global hydrology lab at University of North Carolina, told Live Science. "But areas that are the fastest changing are more likely to be man-made."
[...] More research is now needed to determine just how accurate river color is at determining ecosystem health and which changes are important to monitor.
Also at: Phys.org.
Journal Reference:
John R. Gardner, Xiao Yang, Simon N. Topp, et al. The Color of Rivers, Geophysical Research Letters (DOI: 10.1029/2020GL088946)
(Score: 5, Informative) by multistrand on Monday January 11 2021, @01:40AM (6 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @02:54AM (3 children)
Not a chance for those rivers to turn Republican, then.
No wonder the conservatives don't have any conservationism streak in them.
(grin)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @03:13AM (1 child)
I don't think you want to see the rivers turn red.
And the third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and fountains of waters; and they became blood. And I heard the angel of the waters say, Thou art righteous, O Lord, which art, and wast, and shalt be, because thou hast judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy. And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous are thy judgments. — Revelation 16:4-7
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @11:50AM
The rivers will run red.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @03:40AM
I think the Cuyahoga River managed that trick.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @03:19AM
Thanks! I figured it was due to algae or sediment, but the poster should have included this info in the summary.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @02:17PM
Agricultural runoff seems a likely candidate for making happy algae?
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @03:09AM
See, even the rivers are running away from the democrats.
(Score: 3, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 11 2021, @03:27AM (13 children)
I dunno what the fuck rivers they've been looking at but you do not see blue rivers in the US. Not ever. You can have a river the color of the local sediment. You can have a river with algae. You can have a river that's looks like a very dark shade of whatever the river bed color is. You can even have a river that's the color of fire, because it's actually on fire. One thing you will never see though is a blue river.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @03:43AM (3 children)
did not read the article, but plent of pics online look more blue, or greyishblue when the bottom is not too close to surface and sun not too bright.
https://www.pexels.com/search/river/ [pexels.com]
would otherwise agree most rivers i have seen, would charactise as brown, unless the algie is blooming or sediments swirling.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 11 2021, @04:04AM
Reflections of the sky don't count. Mirrors aren't the colors they reflect. The only one I saw there that was actually remotely blue was really more green than blue and that was from mineral deposits in the bed.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @05:09AM (1 child)
https://www.google.com/search?q=niagara+river [google.com] then hit image search for what must be one of the most photographed rivers anywhere.
Varies from green to blue...except where there is white water in the rapids and over the Falls.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 11 2021, @06:17AM
I've seen Niagara a number of times. Sometimes, it is a nice pretty blue. The lake behind the falls, the river below the falls, even the falls itself. But that isn't all the time. Weather conditions, more than anything, dictate that all that water usually looks brown.
(Score: 1) by fustakrakich on Monday January 11 2021, @04:33AM (1 child)
Well, all the fall foliage and other crap is washing into the rivers now that there's hardly any snow to keep it covered up during the winter. That will change the color a bit.
La politica e i criminali sono la stessa cosa..
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 11 2021, @04:55AM
That's always been a thing unless you live way up where the rivers are tiny to begin with. Only the top third of the US has any likelihood at all of snow cover for even most of the winter.
I always liked when a hurricane rolls in and you get to come out of the shower smelling like a pine tree air freshener for months; that was loads of fun.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 11 2021, @06:12AM (3 children)
I had pretty much the same to say. In fact, the lakes, oceans, and seas are seldom blue. Yeah, it happens, but not every day.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday January 11 2021, @12:04PM (2 children)
Happens in the Gulf of Mexico sometimes, never seen it on a river or lake though.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday January 11 2021, @03:08PM (1 child)
Most often in Minnesota. I've come around a bend in the road, and looked out across a sparkling blue lake. A couple days later, on the return trip, there wouldn't be a bit of blue anywhere. That seems to indicate that maybe the blue was just reflection of the blue sky when the water was calm.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday January 12 2021, @03:20PM
Yup, reflections don't count.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 11 2021, @01:59PM (1 child)
The Mississippi is pretty damn blue in MN.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Tuesday January 12 2021, @03:22PM
Reflecting the sky doesn't count. That's the sky being blue not the river, just like we don't say mirrors are whatever color they happen to be reflecting at the time.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by wisnoskij on Monday January 11 2021, @02:11PM
This. If a river has clear water it is going to be shallow enough that its color is the riverbed.
(Score: 2) by Dr Spin on Monday January 11 2021, @01:23PM
... Supporting Trump is a bad plan for the environment!
Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!