The Salt Waters

1. Work with the interactive map, available at https://bit.ly/3O5RUVy , to understand how sea salinity changes over time.
2. Use the given questions and tasks to formulate your conclusions and participate in the discussion:

• • In which regions does salinity change significantly between seasons?
  • Find a sea in which salinity hardly changes. What is this sea? Is its salinity high or low?
  • Choose a beach that interests you and find out the salinity forecast for tomorrow.

What is halocline?

This interesting phenomenon is also called salt kiss.

A halocline is formed when two water masses with a large difference in salinity meet and do not mix easily due to density differences caused by large differences in salinity. The transition in salinity may be abrupt or gradual, depending on the specific conditions.

It can be both a horizontal and a vertical halocline (for example: when large quantities of freshwater flow from rivers into the sea; at the boundary between two seas of different salinity; or at the sea and the ocean). To produce a halocline, one body of water must be five times saltier than the other. A strong contrast is then produced between the upper and lower layers of seawater and they are visibly distinguished from each other. The flora and fauna are also different and specific to each layer.

Halocline can result from a variety of processes, including differences in temperature and evaporation rates, as well as freshwater inflow from rivers or melting sea and ocean ice.

See photos of halocline: