Latest news with #endemicSpecies
Vogue
02-07-2025
- Vogue
One of the World's Most Remote Islands Is Now More Accessible Than Ever
Saint Helena's trio of peaks pierce through a sea of cloud, six hours after our flight departs South Africa—a blink of time compared to the six-day sea voyage required until 2017. Located 2,000 kilometers from the continent, and almost halfway to Brazil, this shard of basalt—often grouped with its sister islands, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha, which lie only marginally closer—forms one of the most isolated territories on Earth. What secrets would Saint Helena reveal in the coming days, shrouded in the same enigmatic mist through which it first emerged? Until 2017, the only way to reach Saint Helena was by sea—a six-day voyage from South Africa. Photo: Jethro Kiernan Though best known as the island where Napoleon Bonaparte was exiled and ultimately died, Saint Helena's historical footnote belies a far richer identity—one rooted in extraordinary natural beauty. When Charles Darwin landed on its shores in 1836 as part of his round-the-world HMS Beagle expedition, he marveled at its otherworldly biodiversity. Saint Helena, he wrote, was a 'remarkable' place that 'excites our curiosity.' How right he was. Roughly the size of San Francisco, the island is home to more than 500 endemic species of flora and fauna—25 times more per square kilometer than the Galápagos Islands, whcih famously helped shape his theory of evolution. Stepping onto the tarmac, the first sensation is of alpine-fresh air, laced with a salty fret that drifts in from the South Atlantic. Forged by volcanic eruptions that ceased around seven million years ago, Saint Helena rises dramatically to 800 meters above sea level. I drive north along a steep, slaloming road to Jamestown, the capital—a cluster of Georgian buildings ensconced within one of the deep, narrow ravines that define the island's singular topography.
Arab News
01-07-2025
- Science
- Arab News
What We Are Reading Today: ‘Wildlife of the Eastern Caribbean'
Author: STEVE HOLLIDAY AND GILL HOLLIDAY This is the first photographic field identification guide to Eastern Caribbean birds, mammals, amphibians, reptiles, land crabs, dragonflies, and butterflies. Beautiful and easy-to-use, the guide covers 17 island groups stretching from the Virgin Islands south through the Lesser Antilles, from Anguilla to Grenada, where a unique range of flora and fauna evolved in relative isolation. Around 30 percent of all the species included are endemic to the region.
