Volkan Demir

Anchoring Damage on Seagrass Meadows (Posidonia oceanica (L.) Delile) in Fethiye-Göcek Specially Protected Area (Eastern Mediterranean Sea, Turkey)

ABSTRACT OKUDAN, E.S., DEMIR, V., KALKAN, E and KARHAN, S.U., 2011. Anchoring Damage on Seagrass-Meadows (Posidonia oceanica (L.) Delile) in Fethiye-Göcek Specially Protected Area (Eastern Mediterranean Sea, Turkey). In: Micallef, A. (ed.), MCRR3-2010 Conference Proceedings, Journal of Coastal Research, Special Issue, No. 61, pp. 417-420. Grosseto, Tuscany, Italy, ISSN 0749-0208. This paper aims to describe the impacts of anchoring on the structure of the seagrass Posidonia oceanica (L.) Delile meadows in Fethiye-Göcek Specially Protected Area (Eastern Mediterranean Sea, Turkey). This area, hosting five marinas with yacht capacity of 1210 and over 2500 yacht visitors per day in the summer season, is one of the important marine tourism centers in the Eastern Mediterranean zone. Besides, during summer months in particular, yachts and daily excursion/blue voyage tour boats have used most of the bays in the area as the pleasure travel and accommodation sites. In this work, we provide evidence that the anchoring had a negative effect on the meadow cover. Field surveys, including 581 scuba and 335 free dives revealed significant differences in the cover and conservation status of the meadow between areas characterized by the presence of the scars caused anchors and their chains and areas without them.