Zooplankton and the lunar cycle

This illustration was created as part of “Magic Moon Week”, an illustration challenge on Instagram created by illustrators Weronika Salach, Asia Orlando, Debi Hudson, Maggie Stephenson, Olivia Buerki, Myrjam Deruiter and Petra Braun.

Zooplankton are a group of microscopic organisms that drift along with water currents at sea and freshwater. Everyday they migrate up and down the water guided by the sun. By day they stay in the depths to avoid predation, and by night they come up to feed on phytoplankton.

This illustration aims to represent the vertical migration of zooplankton in the Arctic Ocean during polar night, when there is no sunlight in the winter months. In absence of the sun, zooplankton migrate according to the lunar cycle. Around the full moon, they migrate deeper in the water once the moon appears over the horizon.