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¹ Instituto Politécnico Nacional, Centro Interdisciplinario de Ciencias Marinas

The intensifying impacts of aridity and water stress on the dynamics and ecological degradation of wetlands inNorth Africa are often underestimated and largely remain unquantified. To address this deficiency, we assesseddecadal changes in the sedimentary, sea surface salinity (SSS), and microfaunistic patterns of the Bizerte Lagoon,a climatically vulnerable area in the southern Mediterranean basin. Findings from sediment transport analysisindicate preferential current dispersion along the lagoon ridge associated with mixtures of sedimentary distributions.The changes in SSS between 2004 and 2016 reveal an increase of approximately 40% in areas where theriver flows into the lagoon. Findings from the microfaunistic analysis suggest that over the last few decades, aprogressive enrichment of alien marine species has occurred in the lagoon owing to changes in SSS and sedimentation.Results also revealed the unexpected presence of tropical to subtropical Larger B-bearing Foraminifera(LBF) species, which are exogenic to the warm southern Mediterranean coasts. The study findingshighlight the impacts of damming and changes in precipitation patterns on the degradation of biodiversity in theBizerte Lagoon and in other lagoonal systems in North Africa with similar levels of aridity.

Palabras clave: lagoon; Sedimentation; Microfauna; Sea surface salinity; Damming; Wetlands; Water stress

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