It's the ocean's northern lights, she said. ".
This was Emma Tumulty's reaction when she finally saw a supernatural natural phenomenon on the Welsh coasts after years of hoping.
Bioluminescent plankton, which are microscopic organisms floating in the sea and have the capacity to emit light when disturbed by a predator or motion, are responsible for the ethereal blue light that flashes along the edge of a wave as it approaches the shore.
As a result, a light show is created for curious onlookers who are arriving at Welsh beaches late at night in an effort to see the plankton for themselves.
The power of social media, just like with other natural phenomena like the northern lights, has helped spread awareness of them and made it simpler for people to share real-time information about where they have been spotted.
This June, Emma finally struck it rich, crossing something off her "bucket list" as she witnessed the plankton in action in the wee hours of the morning at Caswell Bay in Gower, Swansea.
About 15 years ago, the 42-year-old Cardiff teacher was on a night dive when she first encountered bioluminescent plankton; at the time, she was unaware that it could be found much closer to home.
When she learned about it, she was determined to witness it in her country of origin.
It all began, she said, "when I went to Anglesey three years ago in the hopes of seeing the bioluminescence at Penmon Point because it's a really good place to see it.".
In that regard, she is right. After five years of attempting, Anglesey photographer Gareth Mon Jones finally succeeded in taking beautiful moving and still pictures at Penmon Point last year.
Emma's luck was not as good. She stayed for a week and tried going out every night, but it was ineffective.
Last weekend, she went with three friends for an overnight stay at Gower with the goal of making it happen. She joined the Facebook group Bioluminescent plankton watch last year, which provides information to plankton seekers.
"It was a risk, but one that was worthwhile taking. Nothing compares to seeing it in Wales, right outside your front door, she said.
Three bays were surveyed. When we went to Oxwich and I went to Caswell, neither place had anything.
"Them we believed we'd try Caswell once more. It became very clear as we strolled along the beach. The water was illuminated. With a wave, it entered.
It was so incredible that we stayed for an hour. It is what I would refer to as the ocean's northern lights. ".
Emma finally left the beach at two in the morning, but she will be going back to Newton beach in Porthcawl the following weekend in the hopes of catching it again.
She gave the following advice to those who wanted to witness it for themselves: "It's got to be very dark.". "There are no headlights or torches. ".
There have been complaints, some of which have been posted on the group, about crowds of people coming and shining torches at the sea, making it impossible for others to see the phenomenon, but Emma believes it's possible that people are unaware that they are not required to do so.
"When it entered Caswell, everyone was astounded, and torches all lit up. People are unaware of the necessity for total darkness. People were enraptured by and in awe of nature. ".
The Facebook group's membership has skyrocketed since its inception in 2017, according to one of its founding members, Peter Ryan, who owns a rental cottage business in the Swansea Valley.
The first year, there were only a few hundred members; however, the following year, things "snowballed" and 10,000 people signed up, the man claimed.
Almost 38,000 people have signed up as of this writing.
According to Peter, there is never any guarantee that the plankton will show up on any given night or location, which some people initially find difficult to comprehend. Additionally, weather and tidal conditions can significantly change from sighting to sighting.
The best times to see it, according to his experience, are right now between midnight and three in the morning, on south-west facing bays, and typically on an incoming tide.
The bioluminescence is one more compelling reason for 44-year-old Brynmawr, Blaenau Gwent firefighter and semi-pro photographer Thomas Winstone to grab his camera and head to the coast every night.
As the beaches of south Wales are a good location for capturing the night skies, he quickly joined the Facebook group and found it to be a natural extension of the astro-photography he was already doing.
You arrive late at night or early in the morning. When you look at the pictures, you wonder what that blue glow on the waves is.
He admitted, "I couldn't get enough of it, but you can still go out many times and not get anything. Last night, I stayed out until 2 in the morning, and there was nothing. ".
On the other hand, based on his observations from previous nights, he has occasionally come close to being able to set his watch for the moment the plankton will begin to put on their show.
Although many plankton hunters move from beach to beach as sighting reports flood the internet, he prefers to stay put because he has had enough experience moving only to discover that people later saw the lights at the very location he left.
And regardless of whether plankton show up, he claims the entire experience is better for the body and mind than "sitting inside watching Eastenders or Coronation Street.". He believes that the best course of action is to gently educate people about it, despite the fact that the increase in the number of people looking for it can lead to problems.
The issue with many people going is that they have their headlights and torches on. They believe that to see it, they must turn on the lights, but it actually glows on its own.
"Obviously [we are] trying to keep people safe if they need to traverse a rocky beach," he said, adding that people could use torches to descend but turn them off once they were on level ground.
Because of the publicity surrounding it and social media, there are undoubtedly many more people attending. ".
He did, however, add: "The season has just begun. After seeing it once, people will be pleased.
Only the fanatics, such as myself, go out three or four nights a week. ".
Dr. Christopher Lowe, a marine biology lecturer at Swansea University, can easily access the Swansea bay and Gower beaches from his place of employment, where eager spotters are known to congregate.
A particularly good year for plankton conditions, with clearer seas than usual, has resulted from the recent period of sunny, calm weather, he explained.
If you go to the Gower right now, you'll notice that the water is quite blue; this is because a lot of sediment has settled out of the water. In order for these plankton to be able to grow, more light must be available, he explained.
The springtime's nutrient-rich waters and light provided the ideal environment for phytoplankton, or plant plankton, to grow and animal plankton to arrive and feed on them, according to him. He claimed that the seas experienced seasons similar to those on land.
A lot of these organisms will produce light, which is fun. He added that it would either startle the predator or possibly light it up enough so that it became prey for another creature. "They do that as a predator avoidance mechanism," he said.
However, a person throwing a rock into the water or even the motion of the waves can cause the same reaction.
"We get these stunning displays of the bioluminescence because the wave movement is the same as what they would experience if there was a predator nearby.
. "
