Greek tragedy: the rare seals hiding in caves to escape tourists | Wildlife

DDeep in a sea cave in the northern Sporades of Greece, a bulky shape moves in the darkness. Someone on the boat bobbing quietly on the water nearby passes a pair of binoculars and yes! – that’s it. It is an enormous Mediterranean monk seal, one of the rarest marine mammals in the world, which, measuring up to 2.8 meters and weighing over 300 kg (660 lb), is also one of the largest types of seal in the world.

Piperi, where the seal landed, is a strictly guarded island in the Alonissos and Northern Sporades National Marine Park, Greece’s largest marine protected area (MPA) and a critical breeding habitat for seals. Only researchers are allowed within three miles of its coast, with permission from the government’s Natural Environment and Climate Change Agency.

With a global population of less than 1,000 individuals, Monachus monachus is listed as vulnerable on the IUCN Red List, reclassified from endangered status in 2023, after decades of conservation efforts helped increase its numbers. According to the Hellenic Society for the Protection of the Monk Seal (MOm), Greece is home to around 500 monk seals (compared to 250 in the 1990s), or half of the world’s population, and therefore has a particularly important role to play in the future of these rare mammals. This seems appropriate given that seals were once thought to be under the protection of the mythical gods Poseidon and Apollo and therefore held a special place in Greek culture.

Monk seals have been hunted in the Mediterranean since prehistoric times for their skin, meat and blubber. While this threat has receded in Greece, others – entanglement in fishing gear, food shortages, pollution and habitat loss – have not diminished. Today, conservationists say, a very modern peril is growing exponentially and jeopardizing this fragile recovery: Greece’s thriving marine recreation industry. Unregulated tourism, for example, has a negative impact on a mammal sensitive to human disturbance.

This summer, several initiatives were launched to reverse the trend, including Seal Greece, a national education campaign. Around the same time, the islet of Formicula, a key habitat for seals in the Ionian Sea, was protected in advance of the peak summer season with a strict 200 meter no-entry zone. In October, Kyriakos Mitsotakis, the Greek Prime Minister, confirmed that two large-scale MPAs would be built. If properly managed (and so far the management structure is unclear), these MPAs could offer a lifeline to the species.

Back on the waters around Piperi, Angelos Argiriou, independent keeper and marine biologist, points out a shore monitored by camera as the boat passes. “We often see seals resting on this beach,” he says. “The fact that they feel safe enough to go out [rest] here, in the open air, it is a very good sign that the protective measures are working.

Seals began to be protected in Greece in the late 1980s, thanks to the Hellenic Society for the Protection of the Monk Seal, which has rescued more than 40 orphaned or injured seals to date.

“Our rehabilitation center has really contributed to the recovery of the species,” says Panos Dendrinos, president of Mom. “Last year we saw a female rehabilitated with a new calf. If you rescue a female, she could have 20 calves in her lifetime.”

Monk seals once commonly congregated on beaches, but many have moved into caves relatively recently due to human pressure. Although birthing caves may have provided shelter from humans, they have often proven an unsuitable habitat for raising young: violent waves can crush them against rocks, drown them, or wash them out to sea. And caves no longer provide reliable hiding places. Once isolated coastlines are now accessible to everyone, from day trippers on rental boats to private yachts anchored in seal habitat.

“A week after giving birth, monk seal mothers go fishing, leaving their pups alone for hours,” explains Dendrinos. “If someone goes inside, the puppy may panic and abandon the cave; its mother is unlikely to find it.”

After 40 years of monitoring the Alonissos MPA, Dendrinos says his company “now sees seals systematically using open beaches.”

AAnother key habitat for seals, Formicula will be part of the new Ionian MPA. The islet is at the heart of one of the busiest sailing areas in the world, but unlike its better-known neighbors Meganisi and Cephalonia, it didn’t appear much on the tourist radar until recently.

Marine biologist Joan Gonzalvo of the Tethys Research Institute explains how tourism has taken its toll on the region. “Six, seven, eight years ago, we met almost every day,” he remembers. “We would see five, six seals in the water at the same time, socializing and chasing each other.”

But with the sightings came the tourists. “What was exciting at first quickly turned into a nightmare,” he says.

The hordes came looking for “seal experiences,” he said. Instead of studying animals, Gonzalvo found himself recording humans hunting seals. On two occasions, humans entered breeding caves, causing mothers and young to separate. In both cases, the puppies disappeared. One day in August 2024, he said he recorded more than 50 boats around the small coastline of the islet. “These days,” he said, “we’re lucky if we only see one or two seals. »

As we talk, Gonzalvo spots a seal and takes out his camera. He recognizes her immediately. “Mm17003,” he says, citing the number of one of more than 40 seals he has cataloged online. As the seal rolls through the water, boats stop and anchor in the new no-entry zones while tourists swim near the protected caves.

Unlike the Alonissos MPA, there are no guards patrolling Formicula and it is up to Gonzalvo to politely signal to the boat’s skippers that they are in a prohibited area.

“It’s still early,” he said. “But inactivity [of the seals] worries me. We need serious investment in law enforcement.

In Greece, NGOs have repeatedly raised the issue of “paper parks”, with inadequate implementation. A study published last year by nine environmental organizations highlighted “only 12 (out of 174) Natura 2000 marine sites”. [EU protected areas] have a protective regime”, but even these were fragmented or temporary.

The hope is that the new MPAs will bring patrols. “The Natural Environment and Climate Change Agency needs more boats and more people,” says Dendrinos, adding that guards currently report to the port police, “a process that is time-consuming and inefficient.”

At Formicula, Gonzalvo fears that time is running out. “If we are not able to protect this important habitat, a small drop of water in the middle of the Ionian Sea, for one of the most charismatic and endangered marine mammals on the planet, there is very little hope for anything else we want to protect in our oceans. »