Chapter 12
Passive Recovery of Mediterranean
Coastal Dunes Following Limitations
to Human Trampling
Alicia Teresa Rosario Acosta, Tommaso Jucker, Irene Prisco
and Riccardo Santoro
12.1 Mediterranean Coastal Dunes: A Wealth of Biodiversity
and Ecosystem Services
All over the world sandy coastal dunes form transitional ecosystems that bridge the
gap between land and sea. The strong environmental gradient that characterizes
dune habitats has a strong influence in shaping the vegetation structure of these
ecosystems and typically allows the coexistence of different plant communities in
a relatively small area (Martínez and Psuty 2004). The complex and compressed
zonation of plant communities along the sea-inland gradient is in fact one of the
most interesting features of Mediterranean sandy shores (Acosta et al. 2003;
Frederiksen et al. 2006) and gives rise to a unique biodiversity in terms of both the
number of different habitats and species composition (Van der Maarel 2003). In
addition to a diverse and ecologically unique flora, a suite of other ecological,
environmental, and economic benefits are typically associated with well-preserved
coastal dune systems. Dune habitats are an essential functional component of
coastal ecosystems and their degradation is known to promote coastal erosion,
since vegetation stabilizes soil against water and wind erosion (Martínez and Psuty
2004). Besides mitigating the loss of the sandy substrate and the abrasive effects of
wind erosion, plant assemblages of dune complexes also offer other important
ecosystem services, such as protection from sea storms, and provide refuge and
habitat for several animal groups, such as arthropods, gastropods, reptiles, and
birds (McLachlan and Brown 2006; Barbier et al. 2011). However, at the present
time, coastal dune ecosystems are considered to be highly endangered worldwide
A. T. R. Acosta (&) Á T. Jucker Á I. Prisco Á R. Santoro
Department of Environmental Biology, Università di Roma Tre,
V.le Marconi 446 00146 Rome, Italy
e-mail: acosta@uniroma3.it
M. L. Martínez et al. (eds.), Restoration of Coastal Dunes, Springer Series
on Environmental Management, DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-33445-0_12,
Ó Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013
187
Passive Recovery of Mediterranean
Coastal Dunes Following Limitations
to Human Trampling
Alicia Teresa Rosario Acosta, Tommaso Jucker, Irene Prisco
and Riccardo Santoro
12.1 Mediterranean Coastal Dunes: A Wealth of Biodiversity
and Ecosystem Services
All over the world sandy coastal dunes form transitional ecosystems that bridge the
gap between land and sea. The strong environmental gradient that characterizes
dune habitats has a strong influence in shaping the vegetation structure of these
ecosystems and typically allows the coexistence of different plant communities in
a relatively small area (Martínez and Psuty 2004). The complex and compressed
zonation of plant communities along the sea-inland gradient is in fact one of the
most interesting features of Mediterranean sandy shores (Acosta et al. 2003;
Frederiksen et al. 2006) and gives rise to a unique biodiversity in terms of both the
number of different habitats and species composition (Van der Maarel 2003). In
addition to a diverse and ecologically unique flora, a suite of other ecological,
environmental, and economic benefits are typically associated with well-preserved
coastal dune systems. Dune habitats are an essential functional component of
coastal ecosystems and their degradation is known to promote coastal erosion,
since vegetation stabilizes soil against water and wind erosion (Martínez and Psuty
2004). Besides mitigating the loss of the sandy substrate and the abrasive effects of
wind erosion, plant assemblages of dune complexes also offer other important
ecosystem services, such as protection from sea storms, and provide refuge and
habitat for several animal groups, such as arthropods, gastropods, reptiles, and
birds (McLachlan and Brown 2006; Barbier et al. 2011). However, at the present
time, coastal dune ecosystems are considered to be highly endangered worldwide
A. T. R. Acosta (&) Á T. Jucker Á I. Prisco Á R. Santoro
Department of Environmental Biology, Università di Roma Tre,
V.le Marconi 446 00146 Rome, Italy
e-mail: acosta@uniroma3.it
M. L. Martínez et al. (eds.), Restoration of Coastal Dunes, Springer Series
on Environmental Management, DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-33445-0_12,
Ó Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2013
187