The estuary of Palmones river: description, climatic changes effects and nutrient balances

F.X.Niell; V.Clavero; A.Avles; L.Palomo and J.J.Izquierdo
University of Málaga

The Palmones estuary is a shallow one receiving the incidence of sudden climatic events, the alternance between drought periods and hazardous floods have followed during more than 15 years and conspicuous changes have been detected in the nitrogen and phosphorus cycles. Some organisms have disappeared and new opportunistic species have colonised the estuary. The more clear changes are discussed, and the balances of N and P have been computed using the CABARET model. A critical assessment of the accuracy of this model for Mediterranean estuarine structures reveals that the inclusion of a sedimentary compartment is essential to reach adequate results able to predict their behaviour.