"Let us now praise foraminifera. Tiny maritime creatures, too simple to be classified as animals but absolutely alive, they grow protective shells like microscopic mollusks and attach themselves by the billions to coral reefs. They live and feed happily there until they die and the ocean pulverizes their shells to powder. It's hard to pick out a single foraminifera on its own, but collectively these single-cell organisms,"
"Shout out, specifically, to homotrema rubrum, the variety of foraminifera that produces a bright pigment that turns its shell red. Happily, this is the kind that feeds out on Devil's Backbone (and the other coral reefs surrounding Harbour Island and its longer, lankier sibling, Eleuthera). When their shells are tumbled and pummeled by the waves and bleached in the sun, they leave a pink slurry that is circulated by the sea and deposited on shore, where it mixes with the typical flotsam of coral"
Foraminifera are tiny marine single-celled organisms that build protective shells and live in vast numbers on coral reefs. Homotrema rubrum produces a red pigment in its shell that, when broken down by waves and sun, becomes a pink slurry. That pink material mixes with coral and quartz and is deposited on shore, producing the powdery pink sand found on Harbour Island and Eleuthera. The intensity of the pink varies with sun angle, tidal cycle, and moisture in the sand. Harbour Island and Eleuthera offer relaxed, pastel-infused beach environments shaped by these natural processes.
Read at Conde Nast Traveler
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