Wrapping Up Field Season: From Sea to Shore

As summer draws to a close, so does another intense but inspiring field season for our team at Nuwat. Over the past months, we’ve been out where it matters most—on the water, along the coast, and across the islands—pushing science forward for Bahrain’s biodiversity.

We’ve explored the quiet resilience of our local seagrass beds, those underwater meadows that store carbon, shelter marine life, and keep our seas thriving. With the support of IFAW, the Global Rewilding Alliance, and Prof. Oswald Schmitz, we surveyed their health, collected vital data, and strengthened our understanding of their role in climate resilience.

We’ve broken new ground in shark and ray research, using environmental DNA (eDNA) to build the first molecular biodiversity baselines for elasmobranchs in Bahrain. In extreme summer conditions, our small, women-led team collected samples across multiple habitats—laying the groundwork for national conservation and revealing the hidden nursery role of our coastal ecosystems. Funded by The Explorers Club and Save Our Seas Foundation, this research is the start of a new chapter in marine science for the country.

And on land, we’ve carried out detailed quadrat surveys, recording the diversity and patterns of life across unique island habitats. Each observation adds to the bigger picture of how these ecosystems function—and how best to protect them.

From sea to shore, it’s been a season of deepening knowledge, expanding possibilities, and proving what passion, science, and persistence can achieve. The secrets of Bahrain’s wild places are still unfolding—and we’ll be there to uncover them, one survey at a time.