Two lagoons in inland Malaga carry a treaty signature from 2009 and a reed belt that keeps visitors off the shoreline. The Lagunas de Archidona are a pair of saline, sulphate-rich basins listed under the Ramsar convention on 5 June 2009 and protected as a Nature Reserve since 1989.
Are the Archidona lagoons a Ramsar site? Yes, listed on 5 June 2009, on top of Nature Reserve status held since 1989. The site covers two lagoons, Grande and Chica, in the municipality of Archidona, with a core reserve of just over ten hectares inside a protected perimeter of around 204.
Two protection figures sit on this site, granted two decades apart: a Nature Reserve since 1989, like the other three protected lagoons in Malaga province, and the Ramsar list on 5 June 2009. Of the 204 hectares of the space only 10.26 are reserve in the strict sense, and the reed belt keeps visitors off the shoreline of both lagoons.
Two designations, twenty years apart
Two protection figures sit on this site, granted two decades apart. It has been a Nature Reserve since 1989, like the other three protected lagoons in Malaga province, and it joined the Ramsar list on 5 June 2009.
What the sheet describes around the water is not only wetland. There are damp meadows and well-preserved holm oak woods, with hawthorn, wild roses and broom, over rolling ground.
The fauna listed on the environmental portal is not what a wetland suggests either. It names reptiles — Montpellier snake, ocellated lizard, Moorish gecko — birds such as common kestrel, red-legged partridge, barn owl and little owl, and mammals including hedgehog, rabbit, fox and badger. The public-use sheet adds that the site matters for waterbirds, ducks above all.
The water moves underground
The reserve belongs to an endorheic area with a name of its own, Los Hoyos de Archidona, and that is where its behaviour comes from: “water circulation is fundamentally underground.”
No river feeds it and no visible runoff does either. Water arrives and moves through the subsoil, which is what allows one of the two basins to hold its surface all year in a dry inland comarca.
That regime sets it apart from Laguna de la Ratosa, described as fed by rainfall and runoff with a temporary character, and from Fuente de Piedra, whose surface depends on the year’s rain.
Two lagoons that behave differently
The reserve is made up of the Grande and Chica lagoons, both inside the municipality of Archidona, and both described as saline and sulphate-rich.
Water is what separates them. The northern lagoon holds its surface all year, with water the sheet calls “fairly crystalline”. The southern one runs through seasonal swings in level and shows greater turbidity.
| Feature | Northern lagoon | Southern lagoon |
|---|---|---|
| Water through the year | Held all year | Swings with the season |
| Clarity | Fairly crystalline | Greater turbidity |
| Shoreline access | Limited by the reed belt | Limited by the reed belt |
| Water type | Saline and sulphate-rich | Saline and sulphate-rich |
One basin that never dries and one that does, inside a single protected perimeter, is unusual among the province’s wetlands. At Campillos the cycle runs the same way across every basin in the site.
Visiting, and what the reed belt decides
The reed belt is the practical constraint: it rings both lagoons and limits direct access to the shoreline, so watching happens from the points provided rather than at the water’s edge.
The guidance the sheet publishes is standard for a protected space:
- Take waste away rather than leaving it on site
- Avoid noise, which carries across open water
- Respect private property on the surrounding farmland
- Use sustainable transport where possible
- Never abandon animals in a natural area
For a wetland built around watching, with 5 hides, the provincial reference is still the Guadalhorce estuary. Reaching Archidona needs a car and a plan, the same constraint covered in day trips from Malaga, and it pairs naturally with Antequera next door.
Ten hectares of core inside two hundred
The internal split is the figure worth carrying away. The core reserve covers 10.26 hectares and the peripheral protection zone 194.27 hectares.
The protected heart is therefore about a twentieth of the perimeter, and everything else is buffer. At neighbouring Laguna de la Ratosa the core covers 22.26 hectares out of 176.15, a noticeably less lopsided split.
Frequently asked questions about the Archidona lagoons
Are the Archidona lagoons a Ramsar site?
Yes. The regional public-use sheet dates its entry on the Ramsar list of wetlands of international importance to 5 June 2009, on top of its status as a Nature Reserve since 1989. Both designations cover the same two lagoons at Archidona.
Can you walk to the water’s edge at the Archidona lagoons?
Not easily. The regional sheet describes a dense belt of rushes ringing both lagoons and limiting direct access to the shoreline, so watching is done from the points provided rather than from the water’s edge itself.
How big is the Archidona lagoons reserve?
The Junta de Andalucía publishes two different totals for the same site, 204.53 hectares on its environmental portal and 203.84 on the public-use sheet. Both agree on the split: 10.26 hectares of core reserve and 194.27 of buffer zone.
Two lagoons, one reed belt, and a treaty signature from 2009.