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The Greek landscape, Location: Southern Europe, bordering the Aegean Sea, Ionian Sea, and the Mediterranean Sea, between Albania and Turkey Geographic coordinates: 39 00 N, 22 00 E Area: total: 131,940 sq km land: 130,800 sq km water: 1,140 sq km Area - comparative: slightly smaller than Alabama Land boundaries: total: 1,210 km border countries: Albania 282 km, Bulgaria 494 km, Turkey 206 km, The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia 228 km Coastline: 13,676 km Maritime claims: continental shelf: 200-m depth or to the depth of exploitation territorial sea: 6 NM Climate: temperate; mild, wet winters; hot, dry summers Terrain: mostly mountains with ranges extending into the sea as peninsulas or chains of islands Elevation extremes: lowest point: Mediterranean Sea 0 m highest point: Mount Olympus 2,917 m Natural resources: bauxite, lignite, magnesite, petroleum, marble, hydropower potential.

Each island is made up from the underwater seabed pushing up the mountain ranges that form the Greek islands chains we know today, in particular the island of Crete in made up from the Balkan mountain range. The islands and mainland Greece vary little in terms of the plant species, trees, shrubs, wildflowers, foliage and vegetation, that is found generally over Greece. In many islands it was common to see oak trees growing, these trees were cut down for use in the building of ships. This was especially the case on Crete where over the centuries different cavitations used the wood for ships. These trees were not replace, as sustainable forest managed timber farms that are now the practice today.

To take a typical Greek landscape, we shall look at one of the largest of the Greek island in-depth to give a general ideal of Greece this island is Crete.

crete is the largest of the Greek islands with an area of 8,261sqkm. It is260km long with a maximum width of 60km and a narrowest point of only 12km. The length of the coastline is 1,046km. It is a mountainous country with 3 major ranges: the White Mountains (Madares) in the West, Ida (Psiloritis) in the centre and the Lasithi (Dicte) range in the East. All of these ranges are linked by other smaller ranges forming an almost continuous line along the island. The tallest mountain on Crete is Timios Stavros on Ida which is 2,456m tall. In the White Mountains alone there are 57 peaks over 2,000m high.

other features of the Cretan landscape are the numerous gorges that mainly run North to South from the mountains to the sea, the high mountain plateaus and the over 3,000 caves. It also has lowland planes and a variable coastline with sandy beaches, rocky expanses, seaside planes and towering rock cliffs.

There are not many forests left on Crete and most of the natural landscape is covered with thorny scrub but there is Europe’s only natural palm forest (Vai), and remnants of ancient pine and cedar woodlands most notably in the gorges and on the island of Chrissie. Off the coast there are numerous smaller islands. The most important of these are Dia off the cost of Heraklion and Gavdos which has about 80 inhabitants and is the most southerly land mass in Europe, being only 150km from the shores of North Africa.

There are no great rivers of note on Crete (the majority being dry river beds that spring to life with the winter rains) and only one remaining natural freshwater lake (Kourna near Hania) and this, and the few remaining wetlands are important for migratory birds.

How was such a diverse landscape formed

Cete sits on a small micro plate at the junction of three major continental plates (the Eurasian, African and Arabic). This creates a weakness in the earth’s surface that has led to many upheavals. About 25 million years ago one such massive upheaval created a landmass called Aegis which joined the Peleponnese, through many of the Greek islands (including Crete), to Asia. Continuous upheavals, sinking of the land, and changes in the sea levels brought about by the ice ages has had Crete linked by land bridges to Africa, Asia and Europe at various times in the last millennia. It has also at various times been divided into smaller islands. These bridges allowed for the movement of plants and animals that have formed the basis for Crete’s present day diversity. There are plant and animal species, naturally occurring on Crete, that can trace there origins to all three of these major continents.

The shape of Crete as we now know it only emerged after the last ice age about 12,000years ago. As the sea level receded the peaks of underwater mountain ranges poked out of the water joining a number of small islands together to, more or less, create the Crete that we know today. In fact, the movement is still going on. The western part of the island is rising faster than the eastern part, a fact which can be seen at Falassarna on the west coast, where it is clear that the ancient harbour became ‘high and dry’ through uplift of the land as time went on and had to be abandoned; by contrast in the east of Crete, the foundations of the ancient city of Olous are underwater.

Crete is pushing up over the African plate at a rate of a few centimetres per year. It has moved 400 metres nearer to Africa over the last 13 million years and continues to inch towards the South. Earthquake activity is quite common on Crete. But the effects of such activity can be minimised with modern building techniques.

Where is the Fresh Water

Anybody who has been caught in one of the Cretan rainstorms during the wintertime can be excused for wondering where all that fresh water goes. The dry rivers fill up and swell (the Samaria Gorge becomes impassable after rainfall!) and you can but wonder that there is only one natural freshwater lake on the island (The Voulegsmeni Lake in Aghios Nikolaos was once a true lake, which is fed by underground springs, but it was linked to the sea in 1870 to provide a safe haven for small fishing boats) and why most of the river beds are dry all through the summer.

The bulk of the island is built on carbonate rocks i.e. limestone and marble. Limestone in particular is a relatively porous and soft rock. Carbonate rocks will also dissolve ever so slowly in rainwater. Herein lays our solution. Much of the surface water is able to permeate through the bedrock and accumulates in underground caverns (it is believed that the Omolos Plateau in Sphakia was once a vast mountain lake which once naturally drained away out of a sink hole to later re emerge as the source of the river Keretis).

These natural underground reservoirs have long been used as a source of fresh water during the summer months by the people of Crete and wind powered pumps (now generally replaced by petrol engine models) is the traditional way of bringing it to the surface.

Lakes such as Ayia in Sphakia are manmade. Infact the Ayia lake is a large reservoir that drives a hydroelectric generator and irrigates a large area of the Prefecture of Chania.

The Effects of Man

It is a sad fact, but on the whole, man has had a negative impact on the Cretan landscape. It is a known fact that Crete used to be a very well forested land and used to export timber in antiquity and the great pillars of the Minoan palaces where carved from local wood. Where have all the trees gone? All we find now are traces of pine and fir woodlands in secluded gorges and other traces of a forested past such as the cedar woodland on Chrissie Island and the palm forest at Vai.

Crete has had a turbulent past and has been conquered by numerous nations. This, and the persistent threat of pirate raids, pushed many of the locals to seek safer havens to live inland. Of course they had to support themselves and they took their livestock (predominantly goats and sheep) with them. In order to create pasture a lot of trees where felled. It is known though that during the Venetian occupation Crete was still well forested and that the trees were looked upon as a valuable source of income and relatively well managed.

The biggest devastation happened during the long Ottoman rule. During this period (which lasted for over 200 years) Crete was in constant turmoil with repeated uprisings and rebellions. The Ottomans where forever taking retribution and also tried to convert the locals to Muslimism. The majority of Cretans, therefore, retreated further into the mountains and took their sheep and goats with them. Additionally the Ottomans did not view woodland as a long term investment and they too stripped the forests of trees.

Removing the trees has had a devastating effect. The constant grazing of the sheep and goats has stripped the soil of vegetation and this means that the soil no longer has a structure of roots to help bind it together. When the winter rain comes the loose soil is now washed down the slopes and much of it ends up in the sea. The long term effects of this are: a) Water now rushes down the slopes (taking more soil with it) and less is held up by the soil from where it can permeate down to replenish the underground reservoirs. b) Too little soil means too little water is retained to support shallow rooting plants (much of the Cretan countryside now consists of tracts of deep rooted, drought resistant, thorny shrubs that can withstand such inhospitable conditions). And worse c) there is now insufficient soil left to easily replace the missing vegetation.

Unfortunately, problems persist. Much of the Cretan countryside is still overgrazed and unauthorised building works are destroying much of what is left of a still beautiful countryside. Even many legal constructions take no account of the existing landscape and no attempt is made to repair ‘construction scars’. Many sites have traditionally been given approval with the merest lip service being given to environmental factors. Another blot on the Cretan landscape is the number of rubbish tips and dumps. Both illegal and legal (sometimes meaning being run by local authorities but deemed illegal by the European Union). Surely this should be a thing of the past in the 21^st Century.

Agricultural Activity

It is known that real growing was once very important on Crete and that both during the Byzantine periods and whilst under Venetian occupation, Crete was seen as something of a ‘larder’ for its masters. In fact the remains of many Venetian built windmills can be seen in many places. Nowadays the principle agricultural crop is olives, grown both to eat and, predominantly for oil. This change has partly been brought about because of subsidies that have been available for olive oil production from the European Union.

Goats and sheep are still herded and salads, potatoes and grapes are grown on a smaller scale.

In the west of the island the climate is a little more humid and some citrus tree orchards can be found.

Around the seaside resort of Malia there are still plastic growing houses that house the Cretan banana.

 This has a strong tasting small fruit and the houses that survive are remnants of a thriving industry which used to have strong governmental support (in the days of the Junta the importing of bananas to Greece was prohibited).  On the whole you will not find large agricultural establishments. This is, in part, due Greek inheritance laws and traditions, which have led to the division of land over the years between siblings.

Agriculture in Greece is based on small-sized family-owned dispersed units, while the extent of cooperative organisation stays at low comparative levels, against all efforts that have been taken in the last 30 years, mainly under European Union supervision.

Greek agriculture employs 528,000 farmers, 12% of the total labour force. It only produces 7% of the national GDP (about $16 billion annually). A large number of the country's immigrants are employed in the agricultural sector of the economy, as well as construction and public works.

Currently, Greek agriculture is heavily subsidised by the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP), with controversial results. Certain deductions of subsidies are planned within the next decade. Greece produces a wide variety of crops and livestock products. Fisheries are also playing an important role while forestry plays a secondary role.

Major agricultural products Greece's climatic and topographic conditions allow for an extremely large number of crops ranging from tropical (eg bananas) to those more typical of northern climates (eg mushrooms).

Major crops

Cereals constitute very important crops mainly for local consumption. Older policies of the Greek state aimed at cereals production being in equilibrium with the country's annual needs. Frequent expansive and defensive people's nutrition, were two factors that galvanised the former policy.

Wheat - Annual production of wheat reached 1.8 million tonnes in 2004 down from 2.1 million tonnes in 1964. Average yield went from 165.3 tonnes per square kilometre in 1964 to 211.3 t/km² in 2004, while the total area harvested decreased from 12,631 km² in 1964 to 8,519 km² in 2004.

Barley - Annual production of Barley reached 220,000 million tonnes in 2004 down from 242,000 million tonnes in 1964. Average yield went from 144.91 t/km² in 1964 to 224.97 t/km² in 2004. The total area harvested decreased from 1670 km² in 1964 to 978 km² in 2004.

Maize, Oil seeds, Olive, Sunflower, Soybean, Cotton, Tobacco, Potatoes, Sugar beet, Vegetables, Tomatoes, Onions, Lettuce, Eggplant, Cucumbers, Green Peppers, Cauliflower, Carrots, Cabbage, Broccoli, Fresh fruits, Citrus, Oranges, Lemons, Grapes.

The Future

Being an island, and with its past land bridges to 3 continents, Crete has a unique nature. There are many endemic species and subspecies of animals and plants that are not found anywhere else in the world. The most famous of these is, without doubt, the Cretan wild goat (Kri-Kri) which, once widespread, is now restricted to the area of the Samaria nature reserve and a number of protected off-shore island sites. If we continue to treat the Cretan countryside as we have, much of this important heritage will be lost. With the advent of the tourist industry it is more imperative than ever that developments are controlled and restricted. We do not want situations to develop whereby species become extinct through ignorance. Extinct means gone for good!

It is surely only a very selfish and short term view that, for example, covers a nesting beach of the endangered loggerhead turtle (Ceretta caretta) with beach furniture. A short term gain destroys a habitat and denies future generations the chance to see such magnificent creatures. Finally the Greek government is slowly getting to realise the problem and the proposed, major development at Cavo Sidero in eastern Crete is only going ahead after the first major environmental impact study in Greece. This is a start and must continue.

All development must be controlled and every effort should be made to make better use of the available water. The Cretan landscape did not evolve to be able to cope with such a massive influx of seasonal visitors and needs help. It is down to every resident of, and visitor to, this magnificent island to respect the landscape and, thereby, help it to recover somewhat, from some of the ravages of the past.