Wildlife you can see now
What is worth looking out for this month in Greece?
VulnerableLoggerhead Turtle
Caretta caretta
Now is a good time: Loggerhead turtle nesting on Zante (Zakynthos) (May to October (peak nesting Jun-Jul))
Europe
Greece is the most fragmented country in Europe: some six thousand islands and islets and a peninsula crossed by mountains have produced a very high degree of biological isolation and one of the richest floras on the continent. The northern mainland keeps the dense forests of the Pindus and wetlands such as the Prespa lakes, where the largest Dalmatian pelican colony in the world breeds, and the Dadia forest, which brings together cinereous, griffon and Egyptian vultures in the only breeding colony of cinereous vulture in the Balkans. Crete adds deep gorges such as Samariá, with its endemic wild goat, and an island flora full of endemics. The Ionian and Aegean coasts are nesting grounds for the loggerhead turtle, and the waters of the Sporades hold the most endangered marine mammal in Europe.
National animal: The dolphin is the de facto emblematic animal; the owl was the symbol of classical Athens
The Mediterranean monk seal, so common in antiquity that it appeared on Greek coins and in the writings of Homer and Aristotle, was reduced to a few hundred animals sheltering in sea caves that are hard to reach. Greece holds most of the world population, above all in the Alonissos marine park, and the recovery has been solid enough for the IUCN to keep downgrading its threat category from Critically Endangered to Vulnerable.
Zakynthos holds one of the largest loggerhead turtle nesting beaches in the Mediterranean, with a long history of conflict between tourism and protection. Dadia sustains the Balkan cinereous vulture through supplementary feeding stations and the fight against poisoning.
Alonissos between May and September for monk seals and seabirds. Prespa in spring for pelicans in breeding condition, their pouches stained orange. Dadia year-round from the vulture hide.
What is worth looking out for this month in Greece?
VulnerableLoggerhead Turtle
Caretta caretta
Now is a good time: Loggerhead turtle nesting on Zante (Zakynthos) (May to October (peak nesting Jun-Jul))
624 species found
Based on what we already know about Greece.
