Landsat, Rupert Körfezi’ndeki kahverengi tonlarının kaynağını gösteriyor

A Landsat 9 image taken on 27 September 2026 shows tea-coloured rivers spreading across the mudflats of Hannah and Rupert bays in Canada before meeting the darker water of James Bay. Much of the rivers’ colour comes from coloured dissolved organic matter, or CDOM, which leaches from decaying leaves, roots, bark and soil as waterways cross boreal forests and wetlands. Because CDOM absorbs blue and ultraviolet light, it makes the water look brown. The lighter plumes near the shore have a different source: tides and river currents stir fine mud and other sediment from the shallow flats. Those flats continue to develop as rivers deposit material and postglacial rebound gradually raises the landscape. Moisture and vegetation also explain the green patterns on land, where forested stream channels appear darker than poorly drained peat bogs. The image therefore records several interacting biological, geological and hydrological processes rather than a single cause of discolouration.