The hydrology of the Strait of Messina accommodates a variety of populations of marine organisms. The intense currents and characteristic chemistry of the waters of the Strait determine an extraordinary biocoenosis in the Mediterranean Sea with a high abundance and diversity of species; the Strait of Messina, therefore constitutes an area of fundamental importance for biodiversity. Intense and alternate currents, the low temperature and an abundance of transported nitrogen and phosphorus transported to the surface from deep waters supports both pelagic and coastal benthic populations in a cycle of organic substance.
All this, with associated phenomena, determines an ecological rearrangement that simulates Atlantic conditions for species with a prevailing Western distribution. In fact, numerous primarily Atlantic species, for example the laminariae (large tawny algae), though also present in some other zones of the Mediterranean, succeed in forming true structured submarine forests only in the Strait of Messina and are evidence of the optimal environmental conditions there.
