ALBORAN

Around six million years ago, a gigantic waterfall started the overflow of the Atlantic into the Alboran basin.
Situated at the intersection of three biogeographic areas, the Lusitanian, the Mauritanian and the Mediterranean, Alboran is a region of unique biological diversity. On the other hand, the clashing of the Atlantic and Mediterranean waters in a basin composed of volcanic ridges, escarpments, canyons and abyssal plains, results in an extraordinary productivity.

Unique for its extraordinary oceanography, playing a key role as the hydrological motor of the western Mediterranean Sea, unique for its historic and cultural treasures, for its strategic importance to regional and international socioeconomic interests and a hotspot of biodiversity, the Alboran Sea is an extraordinary marine site.

The most visible tip of this "iceberg" of biodiversity is the variety and abundance of top predators, and especially cetaceans, sea birds and sea turtles.

Cetaceans

Seven species of cetacean are present year round in the Alboran Sea, and others as the fin whale occasionally travel through these waters on their transoceanic journeys. Alboran's deep waters are of special importance for odontocetes (toothed whales) feeding on deep sea squid, as pilot whales, beaked whales, spermwhales, Risso's dolphin and striped dolphin. For species as the orca, the bottlenose dolphin or the common dolphin the main interest in Alboran lies in the diversity of high nutritious value food sources as small pelagic fish or the blue fin tuna.

Sea birds

Among the many sea bird species that aggregate in the Alboran Sea to feed in its nutrient rich waters or nest on its islands and cliffs, several stand out, as the Adouin gull, the storm petrel and the shearwaters Calonectris diomedea, Puffinus puffinus, Puffinus mauritanicus and Puffinus yelkouan.

Sea turtles

Five species of sea turtle have been observed in the region, although only two, the leatherback and the loggerhead are common. Satellite tracking and tagging studies of loggerhead turtles have highlighted the relevance of certain oceanographic and physiography features in aggregating prey for these voyagers that travel through Alboran on their way to and from the major nesting grounds in the eastern Mediterranean, eastern coast of the US, the Caribbean, Brazil and Western Africa.