Lagoon Explained



Lagoon vs. estuary


Coral reef related




In some languages the word for a lagoon is simply a type of lake: In Turkish, a lake is göl, a lagoon is gölcük. Similarly, in Chinese a lake is hu (湖), a lagoon is xihu. (潟湖)

Contrariwise, several other languages have specific words for such bodies of water. In  Spanish, coastal lagoons generically are laguna costera, but those on the Mediterranean coast are specifically called albufera (es): In Russian and Ukrainian those on the Black Sea are liman (лиман), while the generic word is laguna (Лагуна). Similarly, in the Baltic, Danish has the specific Nor (da), and German the specifics Bodden and Haff (de), as well as generic terms derived from laguna.In New Zealand the Maori word hapua refers to a coastal lagoon formed at the mouth of a braided river where there is mixed sand and gravel beaches, while the word waituna is the more general term.

Some languages differentiate between coastal and atoll lagoons: In French, lagon(fr) refers specifically to an atoll lagoon, while coastal lagoons are described as etang(fr), the generic word for a still lake or pond.In Vietnamese, Đầm san hô refers to an atoll lagoon, whilst Đầm phá is coastal.

Latin American laguna




Atoll lagoons


Coastal lagoons



See also

Notes and References

  1. Book: Davis, Richard A., Jr. . The Evolving Coast . 1994 . Scientific American Library . New York . 9780716750420 . 101, 107 .
    • Encyclopedia: Allaby, Michael . Oxford Dictionary of Earth Sciences . Lagoon . 1990 . Oxford University Press . Oxford . 978-0-19-921194-4 .
  2. Encyclopedia: Kusky, Timothy . Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences . Lagoon . 2005 . Facts on File . New York . 0-8160-4973-4 . 245 .
  3. Encyclopedia: Nybakken, James W. . Interdisciplinary Encyclopedia of Marine Sciences . Lagoon . 2003 . Grolier Academic Reference . 2 G-O . Danbury, Connecticut . 0-7172-5946-3 . 189–90.
  4. Book: Reid, George K.. Ecology of Inland Waters and Estuaries. Van Nostrand Reinhold Company. New York. 1961. 74.
  5. Aronson . R. B. . Hurricane effects on backreef echinoderms of the Caribbean . 10.1007/BF00334473 . Coral Reefs . 12 . 3–4 . 139–142 . 1993 .
  6. Book: 263. Encyclopedia of coastal science. Maurice L. Schwartz. Springer. 2005. 978-1-4020-1903-6. 31 March 2012.
  7. Book: Kjerfve, Björn . 1–3. Coastal lagoon processes. Elsevier. 1994. 978-0-444-88258-5. Coastal Lagoons.
  8. Jia. Peng and Ming Li. Circulation dynamics and salt balance in a lagoonal estuary. Journal of Geophysical Research: Oceans. 2012. 117. C01003. 10.1029/2011JC007124. 24 March 2012.
  9. Web site: Goodbred. S., Jr., P. Locicero, V. Bonvento, S. Kolbe, S. Holsinger. History of the Great South Bay estuary:Evidence of a catastrophic origin. State University of New York. 24 March 2012.
  10. Boynton. W. R., J. D. Hagy, L. Murray, C. Stokes, W. M Kemp. A Comparative Analysis of Eutrophication Patterns in a Temperate Coastal Lagoon. Estuaries. June 1996. 19. 2B. 408–421. 24 March 2012. 10.2307/1352459.
  11. Web site: Total Maximum Daily Loads for the North and Central Indian River Lagoon and Banana river Lagoon, Florida. United States Environmental Protection Agency. 24 March 2012.
  12. Web site: Proposed Swimming Enclosure Net, Entrance Lagoon, Lake Illawarra. Lake Illawarra Authority. 24 March 2012. dead. 28 February 2011.
  13. Book: Bird, Eric C. F.. Encyclopedia of the World's Coastal Landforms, Volume 1. 2010. Springer. Dordrecht. 978-1-4020-8638-0. 485.
  14. Encyclopedia: Oxford English Dictionary . Lagoon . Compact . 1971 . Oxford University Press . I A-O . Oxford, England . 1560 .