Back to Blog
Lake natron mummies6/13/2023 ![]() ![]() “I unexpectedly found the creatures – all manner of birds and bats – washed up along the shoreline of Lake Natron in Northern Tanzania. “The notion of portraits of dead animals in the place where they once lived is what also drew me to photographing the creatures in the Calcified series,” Brandt explains. Only invertebrates, a few algae invertebrates and some fish that live near the edges of the lake can survive this environment. Flamingos sometime use the predator-free salt islands that sometimes form on the lake for nesting, but it’s a risky gamble, as the photos below clearly show. As soon as birds and bats plunge into the waters of lake Natron, the minerals start turning their flesh into stone and preserving them exactly as they were in their final moments. No animal can withstand this caustic environment and venturing into the alkaline environment is usually fatal. The lake’s alkalinity is similar to that of ammonia, with a pH between 9 and 10.5, and the temperature of the water can reach 60 ☌. It’s the same mineral the Egyptians used to preserve their mummies. Natron, which gives the lake its name, is a naturally occurring compound found in volcanic ash.
0 Comments
Read More
Leave a Reply. |