Les conditions de milieu au large de la côte tunisienne

Abstract

The Fisher'es Research and Development Project carried out three combined environmental and hydroacoustic cruises in order to assess the potentiality of the pelagic species in Tunisian waters. This paper is a description of the environmental conditions as encoun tered during June/July and September/October 1972, between the surface and 250 m depth, taken along a number of profiles normal to the coast. They show the pattern of, and seasonal changes in, the
the fertile Atlantic current which can be traced by its low salinity values. Two major tongues of this water were observed, one branching into
the Tyrrhenian Sea and the major one continuing eastward along the African coast, usually meandering in several branches. Concentrations of plankton feeding pelagic fish were found to be closely associated with the feature of this current.