Every so often we feature a seagrass meadow from around the world. This week, Richard “RJ” Lilley reports from Samos, a Greek Island in the North Aegean. He is a PhD student at the interdisciplinary Sustainable Places Research Institute at Cardiff University and is exploring seagrass links to food security. He is part of the Seagrass Ecosystem Research Group (www.seagrass.org.uk) and a founding member of Project Seagrass (www.project-seagrass.co.uk).
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[Photos and text from RJ Lilley]Hello again Team Seagrass!
My last notes from the field were 1st June this year when I was reporting from the Turks and Caicos Islands in the Caribbean. Now I am back in Europe once more and into the field again, this time it’s Greece!
I have recently arrived on Samos, a relative small Greek Island (478 km2) located just 1.6km from the Turkish border. A great portion of the island is covered with vineyards (from which muscat wine is made) and the climate so far appears to be living up to pre-trip expectations – “mild rainy winters, and warm rainless summers”.
I am working here in collaboration with Archipelagos – Institute of Marine Conservation exploring the ecosystem service value of seagrass meadows in the the region, and helping to propose potential future management strategies to ensure the conservation of this essential fish habitat.
I am proposing multi-method (UVCs, stereoBRUV and Fyke Netting) surveys of the meadows to study fish assemblages and I a hoping to establish some Seagrass-Watch sites across the local island group. This should be a challenge since the dominant seagrass is Posidonia oceanica and there are not as yet pre-determined protocols for this species.
I plan to remain here for 12 months and so weather and logistics permitting I should be able to generate quite a comprehensive data-set. Luckily I also have access to Wi-Fi, and so if anyone is keen to follow life in the field check out #teamseagrass or #projectseagrass on instagram for periodic photo updates from life in the field.
I’ll be in touch again with our progress, so watch this space!
RJ
For more information on Archipelagos – Institute of Marine Conservation see here – http://archipelago.gr/en/kentriki-selida-archipelagos/ For more information on the Seagrass Ecosystems Research Group see here – http://www.seagrass.org.uk For more information on Project Seagrass see here – http://www.project-seagrass.co.uk For more information on the Sustainable Places Research Institute see here – http://www.cardiff.ac.uk/research/sustainableplaces/ And for those Facebook fans out there! https://www.facebook.com/ProjectSeagrass https://www.facebook.com/Archipelago.gr And twitter…. @ArchipelagoGr @ProjectSeagrass