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The Nature of Sifnos
In the prehistoric times, Sifnos was uninhabited, as well as the rest of the Cyclades islands, with rich flora and fauna. This situation begun to change during the Neolithic period, when the islands have been inhabited and people began burning the forests in order to create fields and grasslands. That’s how the Cycladic landscape has been formed, as we know it today. Its main characteristic are the bushy vegetation, in the spaces that are cultivated as grassland, and the land terraces, in places where grain is cultivated, vineyards or a few olive trees. There have been times when Sifnos and the neighboring islands could feed an importantly large population of residents when the islands were cultivated systematically. However, today most of the land terraces remain waste, as the residents are mainly into tourism.
The ground of Sifnos offers many crystallic and macrocrystallic marbles as well as other rocks. Ferrum and manganese ores appear today mainly at the locations Agios Sostis, Agios Silivestros, Virini, Kapsalo etc. The ores in Sifnos were known since the antiquity. They are mentioned in the work of Pausanias, Herodotus, Stravonas and Plinios.
There is the tradition that Sifnos was once rich in ferrum, lead, gold and silver and because the residents of Sifnos violated the order of Apollo according to which they should send as tribute to the Delphi one golden egg (they sent a gold-plated egg instead of a golden one), the groundswell caused the mines to disappear. The most popular mines in the antiquity were the mine of Agios Sostis and the mine of Kapsalos or Schismades.
During his wandering around Sifnos the visitor comes upon small forests of Phoenician junipers, oleanders and salt cedars and in the sea bed there are colonies of the popular plant poseidonica oceanica, which is protected by the European legislation.
Sifnos is a good passage for the migratory birds, such as herons, water loving birds, orioles, bee-eaters, turtle doves and many more water birds. Of course, there are birds that come to Sifnos and stay for the summer such as woodchat shrikes, swifts etc. There are also predatory birds such as Eurasian hobbies, Cory’s Shearwaters, Bonelli’s eagles, Peregrine falcons, Eleonora’s falcons etc.
For these species of animals and birds which are under protection, the west Sifnos has been integrated into the network Natura 2000 of the European Union.