What is under the ocean at night? Sparks like electricity!?

Question

I was fishing the other night and looked in the water just below me on the jetty, and saw sparks in the water, i went a bit closer only to hear they made noises like electric sparks, "zzzzt zzzt zzzt", like a defective light bulb or something.
There was heaps of them, but could only see the electric blue sparks.
I am amazed, what is it?
Some thought jelly fish, others electric eels.
Anyone??

Answer 1

amanda-

you didnt say where you saw this, but there are many reasons for Bioluminescence to occur. Being on a jetty and NOT on a pier or on a boat in deep water, opens up even more options. Then you mentioned that you HEARD it, which confusess the situation even more. Read up on it here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioluminescence and maybe you can narrow it down a little further.



The usual suspects are suspect, folks.

Answer 2

That blue/greenish glow you saw was caused by a single celled organism called phytoplankton aka red tide and a big school of small fish. Phytoplankton will emit light when agitated. In your case, fast moving small fish in the water were brushing against phytoplankton and causing them to glow. The sound you heard was caused by bait fish boiling on the surface of the water. The colors of the light emitted could be blue, greenish blue, reddish or reddish brown depending on the specie of the plankton in the water. When the water contained a very large number of phytoplankton, each and every single rolling wave will glow. In extreme cases, the whole shore line will light up.



Glowing water:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN1Yxq8KMsw



A ball of bait fish boiling:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9ScOCADysiI&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XMXSSLTzRdU



By the way, when you could clearly see the waves glowing, fishing usually won't be very good. If the whole shoreline lights up, getting a bite will be extremely difficult. Kick back and enjoy the bioluminescent light show will be a better option. :)

Answer 3

It's technically called bioluminescence. In short, it was jellyfish. There are all sorts of creatures in the sea that give off light for one reason or another. One of those reasons is if they are disturbed. You likely saw them under the jetty because they bumped into the pilings as they were drifting in the current. It's fairly common.

Answer 4

these things you saw and heard are from the deep areas of the ocean that rise to the surface at night to feed,they are plankton and are able to release this light/sound bioluminescense decoy to ward off predators and some researchers believe it's also a way to attract a mate,they come up from thousands of feet of water,when the moon is full to mate and return to the bottom depths before daybreak,pretty amazing thing to see,it's fairly common with deep sea creatures that have this,as they spend most of their time in complete darkness.

Answer 5

plankton.

surprised you can hear them though.

they have little, tiny lights called photophores that emit light for attracting prey, for evading predators or for just communicating with all the other plankton.

many larger fish and other sea creatures also have these.

Answer 6

its me nd your mom electrifying the world ;)