Lake St. Lucia is the largest estuarine lake in South Africa and has also
been classified as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Even though this lake
falls within the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, the National Biodiversity
Assessment of 2012 indicated that St. Lucia Estuary resides in a poor
state (van Niekerk and Turpie, 2012). This is mainly due to a history
of human impacts and management decisions that have resulted in
alterations in the mouth status of the lake and freshwater inflow. A
chronology of the important events that would influence the mangroves
is provided in Table 1. Among the many macrophyte habitats
that St. Lucia Estuary provides (described in detail in Taylor et al.,
2006 and Adams et al., 2013) are mangrove forests. Dominant species
are Avicennia marina (Forsk.) Vierh. (white or grey mangrove),
Bruguiera gymnorrhiza (L.) Lam. (black mangrove) and Acrostichum
aureum L. (a mangrove-associated fern as it lacks true mangrove
features such as pneumatophores and vivipary) (Taylor et al., 2006).
These unique forests are situated between the spring high tide and
mean sea level. However, at St. Lucia, the mouth has been closed to
the sea since 2002, resulting in non-tidal conditions with fluctuating