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Islands and plants: preservation and understanding of flora on Mediterranean islands

First efforts to conserve the botanical heritage of Sicilian satellite islands
The Aeolian Islands provide a paradigmatic example of the sharp differences
between conservation legal measures and their present application. Although
most of them are included within regional nature reserves, and although they
belong to the Natura 2000 network and are included in UNESCO’s World
Heritage List (http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/), illegal practices leading to
environmental damage are still very common and usually go unpunished.
On the other hand, after decades of mere species listing, researchers and
politicians are demonstrating an increasing interest in the conservation of
Mediterranean island plants (Delanoë et al., 1996; Montmollin & Strahm,
2005). At the local scale, the first field inventories for conservation purposes
have been conducted (e.g., rare and threatened woody species of Lampedusa:
La Mela Veca et al., 2003) and trials have been made in order to assess the best
multidisciplinary criteria for determining the natural values of some territories
(e.g. Aeolian Archipelago: Lo Cascio & Pasta, 2004). Meanwhile, some LIFE
Projects have already aimed at conserving the vascular flora and the plant
communities of Sicilian satellite islands. The first project, NAT/IT/006217
(named “Eolife99”), focused on in situ and ex situ conservation of four species
on The Aeolian Islands of priority interest according to the 92/43 UE Directive
(Troìa et al., 2005; http://web.tiscali.it/ecogestioni/eolife). Subsequently, some
locally threatened species have been propagated within the Project NAT/
IT/000163 “Riduzione impatto attività umane su Caretta e Tursiope e loro
conservazione in Sicilia” at Lampedusa (La Mantia et al., 2012), while invasive
alien plant eradication is one of the objectives of Project NAT/IT/000093
(“Pelagic Birds”; http://www.pelagicbirds.eu/).
It is important that ex situ conservation actions (through seed banks:
Gómez Campo, 1979; Khoury et al., 2010) and in situ conservation actions
(Olivier & Hernández-Bermejo, 1995) carefully consider the genetic variability
of the threatened species at the population level (Conte et al., 1998; Troìa &
Burgarella, 2004; Palla et al., 2007; Scialabba et al., 2008). Moreover, a very
wide knowledge gap on the reproductive biology of nearly all Sicilian insular
endemics still needs to be filled (Iriondo et al., 1994).
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This paper is dedicated to the first author’s daughter, Jasmine, born two days
after the conclusion of the meeting of Es Mercadal. Moreover, we both are very
grateful to Pere Fraga i Arguimbau for encouraging us to submit this paper
and to Giuseppe Garfì for his useful suggestions that improved the quality of

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