After completing the “Natural Sources” project, BIOSCICAT has determined the need to protect the Mediterranean spring areas against climate change for the conservation of biodiversity.

The Catalan Society of Sciences for the Conservation of Biodiversity (BIOSCICAT) has completed the second phase of the project framed within the “Natural Sources Programme”, ‘Fontinal habitats in the Iberian Mediterranean mountain’. The objective has been to demonstrate the ecological role of natural source systems and to promote their conservation as a strategic mechanism to minimize the loss of biodiversity in the face of climate change. This initiative has had the support of the Biodiversity Foundation of the Ministry for Ecological Transition within the framework of its 2017 call for grants.

Based on the results of the first phase, two parallel analyses were carried out, one for the island area (Sierra de Tramuntana), and the other for the continental area (Catalan pre-coastal mountain range: Sierra de Montsant and Montañas de Prades). The work focused on understanding the bioclimatic mosaic and the fontinal ecological diversity of each massif on a regional scale, in order to select sources with sufficient heterogeneity and uniquely sensitive to climate change. The results have shown that natural springs are the richest habitats in biodiversity in the Mediterranean ecosystem, so there is an urgent need to protect them in the face of the threat posed by climate change and their overexploitation.

These results formed the starting point for convening SICEF, the first national (and European) forum for debate and work focused specifically on the conservation of natural sources as a natural habitat.