Monitoring of coastal dunes habitats in Tuscany through the “MONITO-RARE” project. Poster 56.

“MONITO-RARE” is a project involving Tuscany Region and Universities of Firenze, Siena and Pisa, aimed to improve the knowledge and develop monitoring methodologies for species and habitats included in Natura 2000 Network and considered of community interest. As part of this project, was carried out a first year of monitoring of dunal habitats (Natura 2000 codes 2110, 2120, 2210, 2230, 2240, 2250* and 2260) in five Special Areas of Conservation (SACs). We detected significant differences in abundance and species composition between EUNIS habitat types, between SACs, and between habitat types within SACs. In particular, our data show strong differences between communities of northern and southern of Tuscany.