With oak forests, chestnuts and rugged seashore, Samodraki Island is beautiful, far from the rest of the Greek islands. There are no tourists spending their holidays on the island, nor are there any shuttle services to carry passengers to Mother Earth. The island's authorities are hoping for a UNESCO protection status, but the island's natural environment is at risk from a very voracious goat.
The goat is about 15 times the population of the island, devouring many grasslands on Samoedraki Island and turning it into a barren land. After decades of trying to find a solution to the crisis, experts and local people are working together to find a modern way to save the island's ecosystem and economy.
These goats continue to roam around the island, three times the size of New York's Manhattan neighborhood. They can be seen on rooftops, on trees, or on cars, looking for something to eat. Overgrazing of goats on the island has led to a state of erosion that amounts to a crisis.
Two years ago, heavy rains swept through the island's municipality building, cutting off roads leading to it. There were no trees or plants left on the hillsides, which had been devoured by the goats. "There were no trees to hold the dust," said George Mascalides, director of the Sastnabel Samodraki Assen group. "This is a big problem, and real, because the mud will pour over our heads."
Although this island, with a population of about 3000 people, is difficult to reach, and therefore is absent from the map of Greek tourism. Pastoralism in the mountains is still the way to live, and although it has been trying for three decades, local authorities find it difficult to reach a consensus on how to deal with the issue. The number of goats has increased fivefold to 75,000 by the end of the 1990s due to the availability of abundant pastures, but this number has decreased to about 50,000 as many of the pastures on which the goats depend have disappeared.