The Canary Current is a wind-driven surface current that is part of the

North Atlantic Gyre The North Atlantic Gyre of the Atlantic Ocean is one of five great oceanic gyres. It is a circular ocean current, with offshoot eddies and sub-gyres, across the North Atlantic from the Intertropical Convergence Zone (calms or doldrums) to the pa ...

. This eastern

boundary current Boundary currents are ocean currents with dynamics determined by the presence of a coastline, and fall into two distinct categories: western boundary currents and eastern boundary currents. Eastern boundary currents Eastern boundary currents are ...

branches south from the North Atlantic Current and flows southwest about as far as

Senegal Senegal, officially the Republic of Senegal, is the westernmost country in West Africa, situated on the Atlantic Ocean coastline. It borders Mauritania to Mauritania–Senegal border, the north, Mali to Mali–Senegal border, the east, Guinea t ...

where it turns west and later joins the Atlantic North Equatorial Current. The current is named after the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; ) or Canaries are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean and the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, Autonomous Community of Spain. They are located in the northwest of Africa, with the closest point to the cont ...

. The

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands. An archipelago may be in an ocean, a sea, or a smaller body of water. Example archipelagos include the Aegean Islands (the o ...

partially blocks the flow of the Canary Current (Gyory, 2007). This wide and slow moving current is thought to have been exploited in the early

Phoenicia Phoenicians were an Ancient Semitic-speaking peoples, ancient Semitic group of people who lived in the Phoenician city-states along a coastal strip in the Levant region of the eastern Mediterranean, primarily modern Lebanon and the Syria, Syrian ...

n navigation and settlement along the coast of western

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

and Old Spanish Sahara. The ancient Phoenicians not only exploited numerous fisheries within this current zone, but also established a factory at Iles Purpuraires off present day

Essaouira Essaouira ( ; ), known until the 1960s as Mogador (, or ), is a port city in the western Moroccan region of Marrakesh-Safi, on the Atlantic coast. It has 77,966 inhabitants as of 2014. The foundation of the city of Essaouira was the work of t ...

for extracting a

Tyrian purple Tyrian purple ( ''porphúra''; ), also known as royal purple, imperial purple, or imperial dye, is a reddish-purple natural dye. The name Tyrian refers to Tyre, Lebanon, once Phoenicia. It is secreted by several species of predatory sea snails ...

dye from a marine gastropod

murex ''Murex'' is a genus of medium to large sized predatory tropical sea snails. These are carnivorous marine gastropod molluscs in the family Muricidae, commonly called "murexes" or "rock snails".Houart, R.; Gofas, S. (2010). Murex Linnaeus, 1 ...

species. The current heavily influences the weather of the Canaries and coastal

and

Western Sahara Western Sahara is a territorial dispute, disputed territory in Maghreb, North-western Africa. It has a surface area of . Approximately 30% of the territory () is controlled by the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR); the remaining 70% is ...

, cooling down shoreline temperatures for much of the year and also causing vast deserts on coastlines due to the absence of convection above the cool water. Winds from the vast Saharan Desert to the east may still bring hot temperatures also to coastal areas.

References

* Ansa-Emmin, M. (1982) Fisheries in the CINECA region. ''Rapp. P.-v. Reun. Cons. Int. Explor. Mer.'' 180: 405–422. * Barber, R.T. and Smith R.L. (1981) Coastal upwelling ecosystems. pp 31–68. In: A.R. Longhurst (Ed) ''Analysis of Marine Ecosystems''. Academic Press, New York. 741 pp. * C.Michael Hogan, ''Mogador: Promontory Fort'', The Megalithic Portal, ed. Andy Burnham, November 2, 200

Canary Current (2002)
* Huntsman, S.A. and Barber, R.T. (1977) Primary production off northwest Africa: the relationship to wind and nutrient conditions. ''Deep-Sea Research''. 24: 25–33.

* Mann, K. H., and J. R. N. Lazier. Dynamics of Marine Ecosystems: Biological-physical Interactions in the Oceans. Boston: Blackwell Science, 1996. Print. * Minas, H.J., Codispoti, L.A. and Dugdale, R.C. (1982) Nutrients and primary production in the upwelling region off northwest Africa.'' Rapp. P.-v. Reún. Cons. Int. Explor. Mer.'' 180: 148–183. * William Adams Hance (1975) ''The Geography of Modern Africa'', Columbia University Press,

External links

Encyclopedia of Earth: Canary Current

Canary Current Large Marine Ecosystem (CCLME) project
{{Ocean Marine ecoregions Currents of the Atlantic Ocean

See also

References

External links