CLIMAVORE

In a season of wetland disappearance, celebrating the role of herders and free roaming species and spaces is crucial. The Station aims to preserve these landscapes through the permanence of pastoralist practices. Working with the residents of the outskirts of Istanbul, a post-industrial area that has partially reflooded, opens up the possibility of using traditional Turkish desserts to care for wetland ecologies.

Ottoman miniature showing the Kırkçeşme network infrastructure to bring water from the Belgrade Forest north of Constantinople to the city. Kırkçeşme Su Tesislerini Gösteren Minyatür. Source: Kültür Envanteri. Nakkas Osman, 1579.

Post-mining pastoral landscapes in the wetlands outside Istanbul showing remains of extractive infrastructure dotting the area. Photo: Deniz Sabuncu.

Wetlands, moors, marshes, swamps, mangroves and mudflats have been drained to ‘improve’ land for centuries, despite the importance of their biodiversity, filtering capacity, and buffering against flooding. In the past decades these landscapes have been recognised for contributing towards climate resilience. With 2026 declared the UN Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists, new international focus has been put on free roaming space and historical transhumance routes. The wetlands of Istanbul are not any different. Knowledge brought by Bulgarian herders in Ottoman times, and Turks exiled from Greece after the 1923 population exchange, boosted buffalo milk as an essential ingredient. Since 2013, the region has seen urbanisation encroaching more and more the lands of the Buffalo, fragmenting the grazing commons as a side-effect. Through the study of metabolic interactions across species the Station works to preserve the food and ecological heritage of the wetlands, herders and their pastoralist ways of life.

Baseline Report 2023 (ENG)

Baseline Report 2023 (TR)

Through ongoing conversations with herders and resident groups, mapping encroached pastures is contributing to advance the potential of grazing corridors in Istanbul's overall Food Strategy.

Çamuralem Dessert Shop

Water buffalo milk is a quintessential ingredient in Turkish cuisine that relies on wetland habitats. These peripheral landscapes to the city are culturally diverse and deserve the highest protection, but as the wetlands are increasingly encroached by urbanisation, pastures and roaming corridors are also shrinking or fully disappearing. The Station's goal is to support this unique ecosystem through the celebration of its food traditions and the re-connection between herders and consumers. Guests are invited to Çamuralem to discuss and taste ongoing research on the history, environmental significance and culinary heritage of Istanbul’s wetlands and the buffalos that inhabit them. In collaboration with Ek Biç Ye Iç, traditional buffalo milk products such as kaymak, yoghurt, muhallebi and sütlaç, are served alongside a display of pastureland grasses and buffalo songs.

The space includes a series of metabolic studies by ethnomusicologist Mustafa Avcı, ornithologist Melisa Bal, water expert Akgün İlhan, ecologist Itri Levent Erkol, Anadolu Meraları, and botanist Burçin Çıngay, originally part of Wallowland, a project by Cooking Sections commissioned by the 17th Istanbul Biennial.

Iconic Çukur muhallebicisi buffalo milk dessert shop inside the Grand Bazaar, Istanbul. Photo: Sebah Joaillier, 1890. Source: Tarih Gelecektir.

1 / 3At the core of Istanbul's Kurtuluş neighbourhood, Çamuralem offers visitors a tasting of the city's wetlands through buffalo songs, pasture's grasses, and quintessential recipes of muhallebi, kaymak, sütlaç and yogurt made with buffalo milk from local herders. The dishes are prepared by chef Serhan Hasdemir from Ek Biç Ye Iç, the hosting partner of the project in Istanbul.

Manda Festivali / Water Buffalo Festival

After the first edition of the water buffalo festival in September 2022—with a specially commissioned song performed by Gülinler—Manda Festivali continues on a yearly basis to highlight the cultural and ecological role of buffalo herding and the importance of maintaining pastoralist routes. The festival includes guided walks and workshops, as well as tasting of buffalo milk dishes and musical performances together with the buffalos of Arnavutköy.

You can listen to Mustafa Avcı's selection of buffalo songs in Turkish, Kurdish, Armenian, Greek, and Bulgarian here.

2024 Manda Festivali, Istanbul

1 / 6Manda Festivali / Water Buffalo Festival features performances, buffalo songs, tastings, and guided walks—an encounter on the outskirts of Istanbul to celebrate the presence of the herders in the wetlands of the region.

Çamuralem / Wallowland was initiated by Cooking Sections in 2021, first as a commission for SALT and later expanded at the 17th Istanbul Biennial, 2022. Since 2023, the Istanbul Wetlands Station continues the long-term legacy of the project as part of Water Buffalo Commons, developed within CLIMAVORE x Jameel at RCA. The work is led by PIs Daniel Fernández Pascual and Alon Schwabe (Cooking Sections) with project manager Dani Burrows, Research Associate Merve Anil and local coordinator Kubilay Ercelep with Rosa Whiteley. The project is run in partnership with Istanbul Foundation for Arts and Culture (İKSV) and in collaboration with EK BİÇ YE İÇ, Anadolu Meralari (Anatolian Grasslands), Postane, Mekanda Adalet (Center for Spatial Justice) and Kuzey Ormanlari Savunmasi (Northern Forests Defense). Manda Festivali 2024 in Ağaclı was additionally supported by the Eyüpsultan Municipality.

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1 / 3Crowds gather to celebrate water buffalo at the dancing grounds of Manda Festivali 2024. Photo: Deniz Sabuncu.