{"id":785758,"date":"2026-07-07T09:33:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-07T09:33:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/785758\/"},"modified":"2026-07-07T09:33:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-07T09:33:16","slug":"better-safe-than-sorry-greece-installs-floating-barrier-to-ward-off-toxic-fish-greece","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/785758\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Better safe than sorry\u2019: Greece installs floating barrier to ward off toxic fish | Greece"},"content":{"rendered":"

From his deckchair, his arms thrown above his head, his feet sliding back and forth in the sand, Pavlos Beleyiannis watches his grandchildren bathe in his favourite bay. It\u2019s an idyllic scene, infused with a serenity that the newly retired truck driver attributes squarely to a sense of security.<\/p>\n

For the first time, a floating barrier has been installed across the bay. Ducking, splashing and larking about, the children have not ventured beyond it. \u201cThank god it\u2019s there to protect them,\u201d he says with evident relief. \u201cThere weren\u2019t such dangers in these seas when I was a child.\u201d<\/p>\n

Until last summer, the perils that lurked beneath the Gulf of Euboea \u2013 waters that separate the island of Evia from the Greek mainland \u2013 were, it was thought, limited to purple jellyfish. Last year, the mauve stingers had pharmacists working overtime in Chalkida, the island\u2019s bustling capital 80 miles (130km) north of Athens, after a surge of attacks on swimmers.<\/p>\n

The arrival, thanks to the climate crisis<\/a>, of toxic, long-toothed pufferfish \u2013 capable of chomping through bone, metal and wooden blocks \u2013 has posed a different threat: in an unprecedented step, the Greek Red Cross issued a public health warning in June advising citizens to seek emergency care if bitten by the fish because its \u201cbeak-like jaws\u201d could cause severe wounds and heavy bleeding.<\/p>\n

Pufferfish, also known as Blunthead Puffer and is considered the second most poisonous vertebrate on Earth Photograph: Anadolu Agency\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

In no way should the species be consumed, it said, because of a potentially lethal neurotoxin, tetrodotoxin, contained in its organs and flesh. With no known antidote to counter the poison, the invasive species can kill not only predators \u2013 investing pufferfish with an unparalleled ascendancy in the food chain \u2013 but also any humans who eat it.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur duty and primary concern has to be the safety of our citizens,\u201d says Antonis Spanos, Chalkida\u2019s vice-mayor, who oversaw the installation of the floating barrier \u2013 the first in Greece<\/a> \u2013 last month. \u201cIt\u2019s better to be safe than sorry.\u201d<\/p>\n

At 40, the energetic Spanos belongs to a new breed of determinedly proactive local politician. He says authorities have spent months going through the process of securing funds and putting out tenders to ensure the most protective barrier could be installed, before the system was approved by the state general laboratory.<\/p>\n

Antonis Spanos, Chalkida\u2019s vice-mayor, standing near the bay where Greece\u2019s first floating barrier has been installed. Photograph: Helena Smith\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

\u201cTwo and a half kilometres of this net will be set up in bays around the gulf to allow for a carefree summer,\u201d he says. \u201cLast year it was bad with the jellyfish but, as you say in English, we\u2019ve killed two birds with one stone. Now if there are puffers, we\u2019ll be ready for them too.\u201d<\/p>\n

Phones at the town hall had been ringing off the hook with elderly people calling to ask when the systems would be installed. \u201cJust this morning a woman called in saying she\u2019d only feel safe to go swimming with her grandchildren once it was there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chalkida, it turns out, is not alone. This week Nikos Choulieris, 63, who has long run a diving school in the town, was out with his team in a fast-moving inflatable boat, anchoring yet more of the floating barriers to the seabed off beaches further up the gulf, as other municipalities followed suit.<\/p>\n

Nikos Choulieris and his team helped to install the barrier. Photograph: Panagiotis Moschandreou\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been diving for more than 40 years and never thought the day would come when I\u2019d be doing this,\u201d Choulieris says. \u201cSea temperatures have definitely risen and that has made it all the more favourable for what we\u2019re seeing now.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the coming weeks, an estimated 7km of floating barrier will be delivered by truck to the region from Athens.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think anything will be able to get through that net, not even the fangs of a pufferfish,\u201d he says with a smile. \u201cIt\u2019s very tightly knit and very durable. They\u2019d have to bite away at the same point for a long time to tear it and I don\u2019t think they\u2019re going to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Such is the proliferation of the Lagocephalus sceleratus that officials speak of the entire eastern Mediterranean falling prey to the aquatic pest. Like lionfish<\/a>, which are naturally native to the Indo-Pacific region, the torpedo-shaped species is said by scientists to have been lured by the Mediterranean\u2019s warming waters, entering the basin through the Suez Canal from the Red Sea.<\/p>\n

Fishers in Cyprus were the first to report their catches and nets being decimated by the inedible intruder. In 2024, Cypriot authorities introduced financial incentives to quell the proliferation under a government-backed eradication scheme that has resulted in more than 103 tonnes of the silver-cheeked toadfish being removed from coastal waters.<\/p>\n

The island\u2019s fisheries officer, Katerina Georgiou, has attributed the species\u2019 spread to its \u201cremarkable adaptability\u201d, telling the local outlet Sigma that in the absence of a census it was \u201cimpossible to draw reliable conclusions about the overall stock, or future population trends\u201d. The presence of the pufferfish was not a temporary phenomenon but a new reality that could not be ignored, she said.<\/p>\n

Last week Athens announced a similar \u201ccatch\u201d programme, offering a reward of \u20ac5.33 (\u00a34.57) for each kilogram of the toxic menace surrendered to authorities.<\/p>\n

Greek fishers, who similarly complain of nets and fishing gear being destroyed by the species, will also be given fuel subsides under the EU-funded action plan to be applied, initially, in Crete and the southern Aegean. Once collected, the fish, as in Cyprus, will be frozen and incinerated in government facilities, said Margaritis Schinas, the agriculture minister and a former European Commission vice-president.<\/p>\n

With the initiative aimed as much at protecting the marine environment as supporting coastal and island communities, he said it would probably be expanded.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll this is too late,\u201d sighs Nikos Ayiaskoufitis, 54, enjoying a glass of wine with other amateur fishers in a small harbour that houses the squat building used by their organisation in Chalkida. \u201cNo measure is going to be effective because what we\u2019re seeing is part of the law of nature.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe waters have warmed, these fish have migrated, or are going to migrate this way, and I don\u2019t think the bounty is really enough for professional fishers to want to focus on catching pufferfish.\u201d<\/p>\n

Amateur fisher Nikos Ayiaskoufitis, who lives in Chalkida, fears the new measures will be ineffective. Photograph: Helena Smith\/The Guardian<\/p>\n

Greek authorities have also come up against an unforeseen enemy: lovers of the species. A club calling itself the Initiative to Save Puffer Fish emerged last week decrying the eradication efforts, which it argued raised \u201cserious ethical questions\u201d for a creature that clearly required \u201cprotection and respect\u201d.<\/p>\n

With support from the tourist industry and leading marine fish experts \u2013 who have described the outcry as overblown \u2013 it is unlikely that the catch campaign will go unchallenged.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything we\u2019re hearing is exaggerated,\u201d says Ioannis Batjakas, a marine scientist at the University of the Aegean on the island of Lesbos. In more than 15 years of scuba diving, he says he has only ever seen one pufferfish, although he acknowledges they are prevalent in the seas around Crete.<\/p>\n

\u201cYes, they have long teeth and look scary, and, yes, they can be a problem for fishers and their nets, but like most wild animals they don\u2019t attack humans. If they do, it\u2019s very rare and only because they\u2019re provoked. All of this is a case of much ado about nothing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Beleyiannis remains unconvinced as he looks out at his grandchildren splashing about in the bay. \u201cIf you ask me, these barriers should be installed across Greece,\u201d he says. \u201cI saw two jellyfish in the water just outside it this morning. Why not pufferfish? In life, you never know what\u2019s next.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"From his deckchair, his arms thrown above his head, his feet sliding back and forth in the sand,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":785759,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[49,48,295,66],"class_list":["post-785758","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/785758","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=785758"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/785758\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/785759"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=785758"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=785758"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=785758"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}