Nick Brandt produced some very beautiful and very sensationalized photographs that had many a website convinced you could head on down to Lake Natron, put an animal in and immediately take a statue out.

Not quite the water body of death it was first made out to be… A number of plants and fish can survive in the salt marshes and wetlands around the edges of the lake. The pink colour (and the flamingos) comes from the red photosynthetic pigments in the numerous blue green algae in the lake (and flamingos diet). There are a number of animals that enjoy this as a habitat – unsurprisingly there are bacteria, algae, extremophile (extreme loving) fish alkaline tilapia, and North Africa’s unfortunately named Lesser Flamingo. Lake Natron photograph from paulconormckenzie Flickr As threatening as it may sound it still has some predators such as irrigation and logging of the surrounds, highways and soda ash plants that would extract sodium carbonate to produce washing powder. Combined with its hot temperatures (40 oC) and highly alkaline pH (9 – 10.5) you would not think it the most hospitable lake. Lake Natron (Figure 2) is a salt lake with particularly harsh composition derived from its very special neighbouring volcano, Oldoinyo Lengai, that donates lots of natrocarbonatities (carbonate dominated lavas which are enriched in sodium) to rainwater runoff. Stony Swallow, Lake Natron, 2012, taken by Nick Brandt Wondering what to do with your old birds and bats? The Natron Lake in northern Tanzania can turn your animals to stone with one quick dip! Figure 1.

Lake natron animals in colour