Italy — The Lagoon of Venice

Abstract

Although the Italian rock and shore coastline extends for about 3000 km into the Mediterranean Sea and includes several estuarine and lagoon flat areas, knowledge of the vegetation and especially the changes in relation to eutrophication is still very poor. Some papers report on the flora vegetation along the sea coast, especially for the Adriatic Sea (Pignatti and de Cristini 1966; Solazzi 1966, 1968; Giaccone and Pignatti 1967; Giaccone 1974) and the Tyrrhenian Sea (Cinelli et al. 1979; Buia et al. 1985a,b; Buia and Mazzella 1991; Buia et al. 1992). Many of these works take into account seagrasses only and are poor in reporting the changes of vegetation over time. The situation is quite different for lagoons such as Orbetello and Venice, or Sacca di Goro in the Po delta. During the last decades, all these lagoons were found to be exposed to hypertrophic and dystrophic conditions which were considered to be responsible for the observed changes. In the case of Sacca di Goro, comparative data with the past are lacking and only recent vegetation maps are available (Piccoli et al. 1991). In contrast, the Orbetello lagoon is well known for both its plant populations and changes induced by increasing eutrophication (Lenzi 1984; Caprioli et al. 1988; Izzo 1988; Mittempergher et al. 1988; Naviglio et al. 1988; Bucci et al. 1990). The more comprehensive available data on macrophytes refer to the lagoon of Venice.