Sandy beaches – Where does the white sand at the white sandy beaches come from

Who doesn’t love sandy beaches

I am a big lover of sandy beaches. A sandy beach is the best substrate for laying and enjoying the sun, and to walk out in the water at a sandy beach is a nice feeling for the feet as well as for the whole body. When we have children with us the sand at the beach is also what gives the family life the feeling of a real beach life with digging in the sand, building sand castles and playing around.

Beautiful white sandy beaches are of cause very popular for many when we search for a travel destination whatever it is in US or abroad. Especially white sand beaches are often regarded as a must when we think of an island vacation.

It’s obvious that an island has more coastline compared to the mainland. And because the island is exposed to the sea all around the chance that the island has some bays or coves with shallow water with nice sandy beaches is much higher than in other places. But of cause the formation of sandy beaches is dependent on a number of different factors.

The sand at a beach will always come from the sea, unless it is an artificial supply from the owner to make a beach more attractive. The waves and the current of the sea will transport the material from one place and dispose it in areas with more calm and shallow water. Because of the transportation of the sand by the water, the corns of sand will be sorted after size and density.

During the transportation often through very long time the individual corns of sand will be worn down, becoming more rounded in shape. This is part of background for the nice feeling of walking in the sand, that the sand is being felt soft to touch.

If the beach is in a temperate climate white sand will normally be made predominantly of the mineral quartz. Quartz is the most common mineral at the face of the Earth. Quartz is a very hard mineral and withstands weathering very well. When it is a part of rocks of granite the other minerals of the granite will decompose faster than the quartz forming clays that are carried far away and often deposited at the floor of the ocean while the quartz sand might be deposited along some shores. You can read some specialist knowledge here about quartz

If you take a magnifying glass or a loupe and study a small sample of sand corns you will see that they are much more diverse than seen by the naked eye. The corns of quartz will dominate but many other minerals of different colors might be mixed with the quartz corns. So even if the quartz is harder and more resistant than many other minerals some of the other minerals persist together with the quartz corns. Some of these will in fact have the same hardness like quartz, like granate.

Tropical sandy beaches
If the white sandy beach is in the tropics or in the subtropics the material of the sand is often of a quite different composition. In such cases the sand is often made of calcium carbonate and its origin is from corals, living corals or older geological formations of limestone. Many of the tropical islands have coral reefs out in front of the beach in the ocean, and waves will erode the formation, at least to some extent.

Interesting enough the parrot fishes are biting off small chunks of the living corals and live of digesting the living material. The inorganic content of the bite is discharged from the body and this form a contribution to the coral sand at the beach.

If you have been at such a tropical or subtropical location with a shiny white sandy beach you will probably recall how the corns of the sand had a tendency to stick to your body, even more than you will experience at a sandy beach with quartz sand. The coral sand is often less rounded compared to the corns of quartz, and the density of chalk is lower compared to quartz.

At some of our most popular sandy beaches the sand isn’t only made of coral debris but small pieces of shells from bivalves and snails are forming a rather big portion of the more or less white sand at the beach. Beaches famous for shells and shell collecting include Sanibel Island.

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