«Ever since I can remember myself in the sea, there was only a single time I encountered a seahorse, and that was when I was really young. I can still remember that moment. It had made such an impression on me. Since then, more than 25 years have passed before I had the chance to meet them again, in November 2007, in the sea of Stratoni…»

From that random incident, a sinle encounter, a relationship begun which has lasted almost 10 years.

Since 2007, a group of people started to monitor the seahorses of Stratoni with an ever increasing frequency.

Every year, the group grew in size, every year with more means and funds made available, every year getting closer to them, we realised that only a few dozens were left.

A single nucleus of a few seahorses were gathered in a unique and small, marine area.

In the beginning, we thought that we were the only ones with such an enthusiasm about this.

We were wrong, it was not just us, we are a lot and there are more, almost all over the world.

Small children keep asking us about them, they want to see them, “are they really there? do they really exist?“, a little girl asked.

As we dove deep in our scientific and systematic quests, we decided that we need to do something about this.

And we did.

We created an Institute! The Institute’s main goal is to scientifically document and protect the seahorse colony in Stratoni.

Until this day, for Greece at least, we are not aware of any other site, where seahorses can always be encountered!

Vassilis Mentogiannis