The lack of rainfall (300–500 mm/year) is the consequence of a "shadow" effect caused by the Moroccan mountains of the Atlas and the Rif to the west and the massif systems of the Spanish southeast to the northwest, which prevent the passage of winds and cloud formations from Atlantic storms.

It is a refuge and nesting area for some species of birds that migrate between Eurasia and Africa, such as Audouin's gulls and Eleonora's falcons.

[4] The island has been designated an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International because of its colony of Audouin's gulls.

[7] It has been mentioned as a possible permanent Phoenician settlement despite its small size and apparent lack of subsistence resources.

The Umayyad fleet of the recently proclaimed caliph of al-Andalus Abd al-Rahman III was sent —mainly from the port of Pechina— by him to harass the Idrisí and surround the island.

Two cables away from the E. part of the mouth is a high and steep mountain with a tower, from whose shore a reef extends to the N. the distance of 2 cables, and for which it becomes precise when coming from lift dock the Isla de Caracoles.Limacos is located a hundred kilometers west of the former Spanish domains of Oran and Mazalquivir —sold to the Ottomans in 1791 by King Carlos IV— and there are mentions that it could also have been a possession of Spain in the past,[11][12] but was abandoned by it sometime between the 18th and 19th centuries.

The island was occupied in October 1835 by the French army, in the context of its fight against Abd al-Qádir, opposed to the French penetration in Algeria, with the aim of serving as a coastal surveillance point as well as hindering the supply of arms and ammunition to the anti-French rebels.