Spargi is an island of Italy. It is situated in the

Maddalena archipelago The Maddalena Archipelago is a group of islands in the Strait of Bonifacio between Corsica (France) and Sardinia (Italy). The whole archipelago makes the territory of the ''La Maddalena'' comune in Sardinia. Geography The archipelago consists ...

, in the Strait of Bonifacio between

Corsica Corsica ( , Upper , Southern ; it, Corsica; ; french: Corse ; lij, Còrsega; sc, Còssiga) is an island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the 18 regions of France. It is the fourth-largest island in the Mediterranean and lies southeast of ...

and

Sardinia Sardinia ( ; it, Sardegna, label=Italian, Corsican and Tabarchino ; sc, Sardigna , sdc, Sardhigna; french: Sardaigne; sdn, Saldigna; ca, Sardenya, label=Algherese and Catalan) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after ...

. It is the third largest island in the archipelago, and is uninhabited. It is within the Arcipelago di La Maddalena National Park. The landscape is rugged

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained (phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies undergro ...

, with some porphyry. The island is more-or-less circular. The only source of fresh water is rainfall. The coast is marked by coves and sandy beaches. The hinterland is almost impenetrable. Plant life includes ''

Cistus ''Cistus'' (from the Greek ''kistos'') is a genus of flowering plants in the rockrose family Cistaceae, containing about 20 species (Ellul ''et al.'' 2002). They are perennial shrubs found on dry or rocky soils throughout the Mediterranean region ...

'', strawberry tree,

juniper Junipers are coniferous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Juniperus'' () of the cypress family Cupressaceae. Depending on the taxonomy, between 50 and 67 species of junipers are widely distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere, from the Arcti ...

and mastic. During the 19th century, Natale Berretta, an alleged bandit, hid on the island and managed to elude searchers. When his name was cleared, he brought his family over and settled down. The Spargi wreck is a Roman ship dating from , discovered in 1939. It was a cargo vessel, carrying amphorae of wine. Finds from it are conserved in the Nino Lamboglia Museum in

La Maddelena La Maddalena (Gallurese: ''Madalena'' or ''La Madalena'', sc, Sa Madalena) is a town and ''comune'' located on the islands of the Maddalena archipelago in the province of Sassari, northern Sardinia, Italy. The main town of the same name is locat ...

. Spargi was garrisoned during both World Wars. Some of the fortifications still remain. The ownership of Spargi was the subject of a lightly-contested court case in 2011. The parties agreed that it was worth €127,000. The nearby islet of Spargiotto to the west is a breeding site for birds such as

shag Shag, or Shagged, or Shagger, or Shagging, or Shags may refer to: Animals * Shag or cormorant, a bird family ** European shag, a specific species of the shag or cormorant family ** Great cormorant another species of the family People Pseudonym ...

, Audouin's gull and storm petrel. Secca di Spargi ('Spargi shoal'; also called Secca Washington) is a recommended and marked-out area for diving. It consists of large blocks of granite together with boulders and landslips, and includes

tafoni Although various definitions can be found in the scientific literature, tafoni (singular: tafone) are commonly defined as small (less than ) to large (greater than ) cavity features that develop in either natural or manmade, vertical to steeply s ...

and depressions. It ranges in depth from to . Fish include

grouper Groupers are fish of any of a number of genera in the subfamily Epinephelinae of the family Serranidae, in the order Perciformes. Not all serranids are called "groupers"; the family also includes the sea basses. The common name "grouper" is u ...

, meagre,

sea bream The Sparidae are a family of fish in the order Perciformes, commonly called sea breams and porgies. The sheepshead, scup, and red seabream are species in this family. Most sparids are deep-bodied compressed fish with a small mouth separated by a ...

and

barracuda A barracuda, or cuda for short, is a large, predatory, ray-finned fish known for its fearsome appearance and ferocious behaviour. The barracuda is a saltwater fish of the genus ''Sphyraena'', the only genus in the family Sphyraenidae, which was ...

. The sunlit areas support seaweed; the shady areas are populated by the sponge '' Aplysina cavernicola'' (genus ''

Aplysina ''Aplysina'' is a genus of sea sponge Sponges, the members of the phylum Porifera (; meaning 'pore bearer'), are a basal animal clade as a sister of the diploblasts. They are multicellular organisms that have bodies full of pores and chann ...

'') and red gorgonians.

Gallery

These are some views of Spargi: File:Isola di Spargi 3.JPG File:Isola Spargi.JPG File:La Maddalena - Isola di Spargi (01).JPG File:La Maddalena - Isola di Spargi (07).JPG File:La Maddalena - Isola di Spargi (11).jpg

References

Islands of Sardinia Uninhabited islands of Italy {{Sardinia-geo-stub

Gallery

See also

References