Summary
Since the opening of the Suez Canal, more than 120 Red Sea species colonized the eastern Mediterranean, whereas less than 10 Mediterranean species colonized the Red Sea. For most of the species involved in this colonization, the mode of dispersal from the source to the colonized area is through free-drifting propagules. In order to examine whether the current regime of the Suez Canal may be involved in this assymetry in colonization, a mathematical hydraulic model that forecasts the direction and velocity of water currents through the year, along the length of the Canal, was utilized. The movements of free-floating propagules that occur at either entrance of the Canal, was simulated on a computer, and it was found that the completion of a Mediterranean-bound passage of Red Sea propagules is far faster and much more likely than a completion of a Red Sea-bound passage of Mediterranean propagules.
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Paper No. 7 in the series “Colonization of the Eastern Mediterranean by Red Sea species immigrating through the Suez Canal”
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Agur, Z., Safriel, U.N. Why is the mediterranean more readily colonized than the Red Sea, by organisms using the Suez Canal as a passageway?. Oecologia 49, 359–361 (1981). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00347598
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00347598