Cortegada is an almost tidal island (it is possible to go walking when the lowest tides happen, but a small amount of water flow does not disappear) in a coastal inlet near Pontevedra in Galicia, Spain.

Cortegada, due to its location near the mouth of the river Ulla, is sheltered from the wind within an estuary named "ría de Arousa".

Originally the site of a village of the municipally of O Carril (today Vilagarcía de Arousa), at the start of the 20th century, Cortegada was expropriated from its 211 tenants, on the initiative of a local businessman, with the intention of building a royal summer retreat.

Fertilization due to crops, livestock excrement and bird colonies has caused a change in soil composition favoring some species over others.

Due to the large amount of water in the terrain, it flows in streams everywhere or stay quiet in ponds and puddles.

Cortegada island is valued by many researchers and scientists, as well as by the richness of its sea, for having on its north side the largest forest of bay laurel that exists in Europe.

Many of the species are endemic to islands, and harbour a rich biota of understorey plants, invertebrates, some species of lizards (Lacerta lepida, Podarcis bocagei, Chalcides striatus), slowworms (Anguis fragilis), and snakes, (Elaphe scalaris, Coronella girondica, Natrix maura).

The island has some goats and wild boars (Sus scrofa), wild horses lived there until recently (Crocidura russula, Erinaceus europaeus, Talpa occidentalis), bats (Pipistrellus pipistrellus, Eptesicus serotinus, Rhinolophus ferrumequinum), feral cats (Felix catus), feral mink (Mustela vison), rabbits, mice, rats and birds such as Iberian chiffchaff, the coal tit, the great tit, woodpecker, Eurasian wryneck, collared dove, common wood pigeon, blackbird, Scolopax rusticola, greenfinch, warbler, finch, saithe, stonechat, robin, goldfinch, wagtail, black redstart, buzzard, goshawk, and peregrine falcon.

The trees Salix atrocinerea, Alnus glutinosa, Platanus × hispanica Populus nigra, Ulmus, and allochthonous Cupressaceae are widespread, as are the bird-dispersed shrubs Ligustrum, honeysuckle Lonicera periclymenum, Prunus lusitanica, Prunus spinosa, Crataegus monogyna, Sorbus, Buxus, Osyris, European Mistletoe, Cornus, Taxus baccata, Ulex europaeus subsp.

The location of the Islands in the North Atlantic Ocean maintained the humid and relatively mild climate which has allowed these forests to persist to the present day, although autochthonous vegetation was almost entirely cleared for orchards, wheat fields, subsistence crops and exotic timber plantations of eucalyptus, mostly Eucalyptus globulus, pine and oak in the past.

The understorey of these Laurel forest is low, falling almost to the ground lined with ivy, along with some wood-sage plants (Teucrium scorodonia) and snakeroot (Arisarum vulgare).

Willows (Salix atrocinerea) occupy the eastern part of the island in permanently or temporarily waterlogged soils as the only tree species, mono-specific forest, and on the west side are mixed with alder (Alnus glutinosa).