Canal de Menorca

Location: Canal de Menorca is a marine corridor with a minimum width of 36 kilometers (from Cala Ratjada to Cap d’Artrutx), between the Islands of Majorca and Minorca. It has shallow platform bottoms –a scarce 100 m deep– of mixed nature, well preserved, and of extraordinary ecological value and high productivity.

Area characteristics: Important biological communities develop in its depths, highly representative of the Mediterranean seashore depths. In the more coastal areas there is a predominance of the meadows of the Mediterranean endemic phanerogam Posidonia oceanica, which takes up large extensions of the seabed. The Mäerl bottoms dominate in both extremes of the channel, and we find an excellent representation of coraligenic communities between 30 and 40 m deep, with the presence of benthonic species of great conservationist interest, such as the endangered red coral. Canal de Menorca is also an important feeding area for procellariiformes birds, such as the Balearic shearwater, and it is an essential area for the preservation of cetaceans.

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