Galápagos Islands

The Galápagos Islands (

The islands are located in the eastern Pacific Ocean, 973 km (605 mi) off the west coast of South America. The majority of islands are also more broadly part of the South Pacific.[15] The closest land mass is that of mainland Ecuador, the country to which they belong, 926 km (500 nmi) to the east.

The islands are found at the coordinates 1°40'N–1°36'S, 89°16'–92°01'W. Straddling the equator, islands in the chain are located in both the northern and southern hemispheres, with

The group consists of 18 main islands, 3 smaller islands, and 107 rocks and islets. The islands are located at the Galapagos Triple Junction. The archipelago is located on the Nazca Plate (a tectonic plate), which is moving east/southeast, diving under the South American Plate at a rate of about 2.5 inches (6.4 cm) per year.^[18] It is also atop the Galápagos hotspot, a place where the Earth's crust is being melted from below by a mantle plume, creating volcanoes. The first islands formed here at least 8 million and possibly up to 90 million years ago.^[19]

While the older islands have disappeared below the sea as they moved away from the mantle plume, the youngest islands, Isabela and Fernandina, are still being formed. In April 2009, lava from the volcanic island Fernandina started flowing both towards the island's shoreline and into the center caldera.^{[citation needed]}

In late June 2018, Sierra Negra, one of five volcanoes on Isabela and one of the most active in the Galapagos archipelago, began erupting for the first time since 2005. Lava flows made their way to the coastline, prompting the evacuation of about fifty nearby residents and restricting tourist access.^[20]

Main islands

The 18^[21] main islands (each having a land area at least 1 km²) of the archipelago (with their English names) shown alphabetically:

• land iguanas to the neighboring North Seymour Island as part of an experiment. This move proved unexpectedly useful when the native iguanas became extinct on Baltra as a result of the island's military occupation in World War II. During the 1980s, iguanas from North Seymour were brought to the Charles Darwin Research Station
  as part of a breeding and repopulation project, and in the 1990s, land iguanas were reintroduced to Baltra. As of 1997, scientists counted 97 iguanas living on Baltra; 13 of which had hatched on the islands.
• green turtle
  is another animal that resides on the island.
• marine iguanas, swallow-tailed gulls, sea lions, whales, marine turtles, and red-footed and Nazca boobies can be seen. The remnants of Darwin's Arch, a natural rock arch which would at one time have been part of this larger structure, are located less than a kilometre from the main Darwin Island, and it was a landmark well known to the island's few visitors. It collapsed in May 2021. The two remaining stumps are now nicknamed the "Pillars of Evolution".^[23]
• marine iguanas exhibit a distinctive red coloration change between the breeding season. Española is the only place where the waved albatross nests. Some of the birds have attempted to breed on Genovesa (Tower) Island, but unsuccessfully. Española's steep cliffs serve as the perfect runways for these birds, which take off for their ocean feeding grounds near the mainland of Ecuador and Peru. Española has two visitor sites. Gardner Bay is a swimming and snorkelling site, and offers a great beach. Punta Suarez has migrant, resident, and endemic wildlife, including brightly colored marine iguanas, Española lava lizards, hood mockingbirds, swallow-tailed gulls, blue-footed boobies, Nazca boobies, red-billed tropicbirds
  , Galápagos hawks, three species of Darwin's finches, and the waved albatross.
• Galápagos penguins, pelicans, Galápagos sea lions and Galápagos fur seals. Different types of lava flows can be compared, and the mangrove
  forests can be observed.

• wooden barrel that served as a post office, mail could be picked up and delivered to its destinations, mainly Europe and the United States, by ships on their way home. At the "Devil's Crown", an underwater volcanic cone and coral
  formations are found.
• doves, storm petrels and Darwin finches are also in sight. Prince Philip's Steps is a bird-watching plateau
  with Nazca and red-footed boobies. There is a large Palo Santo forest.

• Queen Isabella I of Castile.^[24] With an area of 4,640 km² (1,790 sq mi), it is the largest island of the Galápagos. Its highest point is Volcán Wolf, with an altitude of 1,707 m (5,600 ft). The island's seahorse shape is the product of the merging of six large volcanoes into a single land mass. On this island, Galápagos penguins, flightless cormorants, marine iguanas, pelicans and Sally Lightfoot crabs abound. At the skirts and calderas of the volcanoes of Isabela, land iguanas and Galápagos tortoises can be observed, as well as Darwin finches, Galápagos hawks, Galápagos doves and very interesting lowland vegetation. The third-largest human settlement of the archipelago, Puerto Villamil
  , is located at the southeastern tip of the island.
• Marchena (Bindloe) Island – Named after Fray Antonio Marchena, it has an area of 130 km² (50 sq mi) and a maximum altitude of 343 m (1,125 ft). Galapagos hawks and sea lions inhabit this island, and it is home to the Marchena lava lizard, an animal endemic to Marchena.

• North Seymour Island – Its name was given after an English nobleman, Lord Hugh Seymour. It has an area of 1.9 km² (0.73 sq mi) and a maximum altitude of 28 m (92 ft). This island is home to a large population of blue-footed boobies and swallow-tailed gulls. It hosts one of the largest populations of frigate birds. It was formed from geological uplift.
• Chelonoidis duncanensis and Galápagos sea lions
  , the island has no visitor facilities and a permit is required for legal visits.
• Charles Darwin Research Station
  on Santa Cruz Island, where scientists attempted to breed from him. However, Lonesome George died in June 2012 without producing any offspring.
• Rábida (Jervis) Island – It bears the name of the convent of Rábida, where Columbus left his son during his voyage to the Americas^{[citation needed]}. It has an area of 4.95 km² (1.91 sq mi) and a maximum altitude of 367 m (1,204 ft). The high amount of iron contained in the lava at Rábida gives it a distinctive red colour. White-cheeked pintail ducks live in a saltwater lagoon close to the beach, where brown pelicans and boobies have built their nests. Until recently, flamingos were also found in the lagoon, but they have since moved on to other islands, likely due to a lack of food on Rábida. Nine species of finches have been reported in this island.

• highlands of San Cristóbal. The capital of the province of Galápagos is Puerto Baquerizo Moreno, which lies at the southern tip of the island, and is close to San Cristóbal Airport
  .

• habitat
  . The Highlands of Santa Cruz offer exuberant flora, and are famous for the lava tunnels. Large tortoise populations are found here. Black Turtle Cove is a site surrounded by mangroves, which sea turtles, rays and small sharks sometimes use as a mating area. Cerro Dragón, known for its flamingo lagoon, is also located here, and along the trail one may see land iguanas foraging.
• lava lizards
  .

• Santiago (San Salvador, James) Island – Its name is equivalent to Saint James in English; it is also known as San Salvador, after the first island discovered by Columbus in the Caribbean Sea. This island has an area of 585 km² (226 sq mi) and a maximum altitude of 907 m (2,976 ft). Marine iguanas, sea lions, fur seals, land and sea turtles, flamingos, dolphins and sharks are found here. Pigs and goats, which were introduced by humans to the islands and have caused great harm to the endemic species, have been eradicated (pigs by 2002; goats by the end of 2006). Darwin finches and Galápagos hawks are usually seen, as well as a colony of fur seals. At Sulivan Bay, a recent (around 100 years ago) pahoehoe lava flow can be observed.
• vampire finch
  , which feeds partly on blood pecked from other birds, and is only found on this island.

Minor islands

• Daphne Major – A small island directly north of Santa Cruz and directly west of Baltra, this very inaccessible island appears, though unnamed, on Ambrose Cowley's 1684 chart. It is important as the location of multidecade finch population studies by Peter and Rosemary Grant.
• South Plaza Island (Isla Plaza Sur) – It is named in honor of a former president of Ecuador, General Leónidas Plaza. It has an area of 0.13 km² (0.050 sq mi) and a maximum altitude of 23 m (75 ft). The flora of South Plaza includes Opuntia cactus and Sesuvium plants, which form a reddish carpet on top of the lava formations. Iguanas (land, marine and some hybrids of both species) are abundant, and large numbers of birds can be observed from the cliffs at the southern part of the island, including tropic birds and swallow-tailed gulls.
• North Plaza Island - This island lies north of South Plaza Island.
• Nameless Island – A small islet used mostly for scuba diving.
• Roca Redonda – An islet approximately 25 km (16 mi) northwest of Isabela. Herman Melville devotes the third and fourth sketches of The Encantadas
  to describing this islet (which he calls "Rock Rodondo") and the view from it.
• Guy Fawkes Island
  - A small island of the coast of Santa Cruz. It is an island group composed of two crescent-shaped islets—North Guy Fawkes I. (I. Guy Fawkes Norte) and South Guy Fawkes I. (I. Guy Fawkes Sud)—and two rocks located northwest of Santa Cruz Island in the Galápagos Archipelago in Ecuador. The group is uninhabited but sometimes visited by scuba divers.
• Isla Beagle - This small island near to Santiago is largely uninhabited.
• Isla Caldwell - This island is near Floreana and has a length of 3.06 kilometers.
• Isla Campéon - Also known as Champion island, this islet is 1.64 kilometers in length and is one of the last refuges of the Floreana mockingbird.
• Isla Watson - This small islet is one of the many islets of Floreana island.
• Enderby Island - Besides of Isla Campéon, this island is another place where the Floreana mockingbird
  lives.
• Floreana
  .
• Mosqua Island - Mosquera is one of the smallest islands in the archipelago. Located between North Seymour and Baltra Islands, it consists of many coral reefs, making it a great site for practicing snorkel and observing the marine life.

Mosquera is also home to one of the largest colonies of sea lions in the Galapagos, and there have been occasional orca whale sightings around the islet. As is usual in the archipelago, the islet is shared by many seabirds, marine iguanas, blue-footed boobies and Sally Lightfoot crabs.

• Tortuga Island - Isla Tortuga is unique as the island is in the shape of a crescent. The island is actually a collapsed volcano that is a nesting location for a variety of seabirds such as Frigatebirds and the elusive Red-Billed Tropicbird, among others.
• Isla Los Hermanos - This is a small island off Isabela.
• Isla Sombrero Chino - One of the most recognizable of the Galapagos Islands, Sombrero Chino name means "Chinese Hat." It's easy to see why: this islet off of Santiago is shaped like an old-fashioned Chinaman's hat, a gently sloping cone rising out of the clear Galapagos water. Because of its distinctive shape, Sombrero Chino has fascinated visitors as long as they have been coming to Galapagos.
• Daphne Minor - It is very near Daphne Major and share a lot of similarities, as both are tuff cones devoid of trees.
• Las Tintoreras Islet - It is a group of seven small islets to the south of the bay of Puerto Villamil in the island of Isabela, that forms part of the archipelago and national park of the Galapagos Islands, including administratively in the Province Of Galapagos.
• Leon Dormido - This island is located of San Cristobal.Visually striking, the two rocks of Leon Dormindo, which means “Sleeping Lion,” soar to some 450 feet (140 meters) into the air. The mild current between the two rocks creates a hotbed habitat for an extremely diverse group of fish and mammals.
• Isla Cowley - This small island is very small, located off Isabela.
• Isla El Edén - Eden Island is a sliver of volcanic rock located along the northwest shore of the large Santa Cruz Island. Isla El Edén measures less than 2,000 square feet in diameter. Despite its small size of .01 square miles, it exhibits three distinct landscapes. One is flat, arid and barren. In the middle is a 233 foot cliff.
• Isla Albany - Albany Rock is a small crescent shaped islet located in the northwest of Santiago Island.
• Floreana
  .
• Corona Del Diablo - Corona Del Diablo, also known as the Devil's Crown, located off of Floreana Island, not far from the shore, is a ring of uneven rocks that stick out of the water. Its name comes from the fact that it looks almost like an uncomfortable crown, that only the devil could wear.

Climate

Although the islands are located on the equator, the

There is also a large range in precipitation from one place to another and across the islands' two main seasons. The archipelago is mainly characterized by a mixture of a tropical savanna climate and a semi-arid climate, transitioning to a tropical rainforest climate in the northwest. During the rainy season known as the garúa from June to November, the temperature near the sea is around 22 °C (72 °F), a steady cool wind blows from south and southeast, frequent drizzles (garúas) for days, and dense fog conceals the islands. During the warm season from December to May, the average sea and air temperatures rise to around 25 °C (77 °F), there is no wind at all, and the sun shines apart from sporadic strong downpours. Weather also changes as altitude increases on the larger islands. Temperature decreases gradually with altitude, while precipitation increases due to the condensation of moisture from clouds on the slopes. This pattern of generally wet highlands and drier lowlands affects the plant life on the larger islands. The vegetation in the highlands tends to be green and lush, with tropical woodland in places. The lowland areas tend to have arid and semi-arid vegetation, with many thorny shrubs and cacti and areas of barren volcanic rock.

Some islands also fall within the rain shadow of others during some seasons. During March 1969, the precipitation over Charles Darwin Station on the southern coast of Santa Cruz was 249.0 mm (9.80 in), while on nearby Baltra Island the precipitation during the same month was only 137.6 mm (5.42 in). This is because Baltra is located behind Santa Cruz when the prevailing winds are southerly, causing more moisture to fall on the Santa Cruz highlands.

The following table for the especially wet year of 1969 shows the variation of precipitation in different places of Santa Cruz Island:

Ecology

Terrestrial

Most of the Galápagos is covered in semi-desert vegetation, including shrublands, grasslands, and dry forest. A few of the islands have high-elevation areas with cooler temperatures and higher rainfall, which are home to humid-climate forests and shrublands, and montane grasslands (pampas) at the highest elevations. There are about 500 species of native vascular plants on the islands, including 90 species of ferns. About 180 vascular plant species are endemic.^[28]

The islands are well known for their distinctive endemic species, including giant tortoises, finches, flightless cormorants, Galápagos lava lizards and marine iguanas, which evolved to adapt to islands' environments.^[28]

History

Pre-Columbian era

Whether

European discovery of the Galápagos Islands is recorded occurring on 10 March 1535, when the

The Galápagos Islands first appeared on the maps of Gerardus Mercator and Abraham Ortelius around 1570.^[38]

Pirate era

The first English captain to visit the Galápagos Islands was

The first known permanent human resident on Galápagos was Patrick Watkins, an Irish sailor who was marooned on the Floreana from 1807 to 1809. According to later accounts, Watkins managed to survive by hunting, growing vegetables and trading with visiting whalers^[45][46] before stealing a longboat from a whaling ship, impressing five of its crew as his "slaves", and navigating to Guayaquil on the Ecuadorian mainland.^[47] Watkins was the only one of the six to survive the journey.^[47]

In 1818, the Nantucket whaleship Globe under Captain George Washington Gardner discovered a "mother lode" of sperm whales some thousand miles west of the South American coast approximately at the equator. He returned to Nantucket in 1820 with more than 2,000 barrels of sperm whale oil and the news of his discovery. This led to an influx of whaleships to exploit the new whaling ground and the Galápagos Islands became a frequent stop for the whalers both before and after visiting what came to be known as the Offshore Grounds. This led to the establishment in the Galápagos Islands of a kind of unofficial "post office" where whaleships stopped to pick up and drop off letters as well as for provisioning and repairing.^[48]

In October 1820, the whaleship Essex out of Nantucket stopped at the Galápagos for these purposes on its way to the Offshore Grounds. On Colnett's Charles Island, while most of the crew were hunting tortoises one crewmember, English boatsteerer Thomas Chappel—for reasons still unclear—lit a fire which quickly burned out of control. Some of the tortoise hunters had a narrow escape and had to run a gauntlet of fire to get back to the ship. Soon almost the entire island was in flames. Crewmembers reported that after a day of sailing away they could still see the flames against the horizon. One crewmember who returned to the Galápagos several years afterward described the entire island as still a blackened wasteland.^[49]

The

The Englishman William Gurney became mayor of a new settlement on Chatham Island in 1844.^[52]

In April 1888

José Valdizán and Manuel Julián Cobos tried a new colonization, beginning the exploitation of a type of lichen found in the islands (Roccella portentosa) used as a coloring agent. After the assassination of Valdizán by some of his workers, Cobos brought from the continent to San Cristóbal Island a group of more than a hundred workers, and tried his luck at planting sugar cane. He ruled his plantation with an iron hand, which led to his assassination in 1904. In 1897, Antonio Gil began another plantation on Isabela Island.

Over the course of a whole year, from September 1904, an expedition of the Academy of Sciences of California, led by Rollo Beck, stayed in the Galápagos collecting scientific material on geology, entomology, ornithology, botany, zoology, and herpetology. Another expedition from that Academy was done in 1932 (Templeton Crocker Expedition) to collect insects, fish, shells, fossils, birds, and plants.

20th century

For a long time during the early 1900s and at least through 1929, a cash-strapped Ecuador had reached out for potential buyers of the islands to alleviate financial troubles at home. The US had repeatedly expressed its interest in buying the islands for military use as they were positioned strategically guarding the Panama Canal.^[59] Besides the United States, Japan, Germany and Chile also expressed interest in establishing bases in the islands at the turn of the century.^[60][61] Chile had previously acquired the Straits of Magellan^[62] and Easter Island for strategic reasons and lieutenant Gregorio Santa Cruz argued in 1903 that possessing an island in equatorial waters, like the Galápagos, would be of great benefit since the geopolitical situation of Chile was expected to drastically change when the Panama Canal opened. Another benefit would be to widen the security radius of Chile.^[63] Chile was alarmed by the United States plans to establish a Guantanamo-like base in the Galápagos Islands since it would mean that Chile's nitrate-rich northern provinces would be within the range of United States Navy.^[64] Ecuador's staunch resistance to a US purchase or bases in the islands can be credited to Chilean diplomacy, which in turn was informally backed on this issue by Great Britain and Germany.^[64]

In the 1920s and 1930s, a small wave of European settlers arrived in the islands. There occurred a series of unsolved disappearances on the island of Floreana in the 1930s among the largely European expatriate residents at the time, which prompted the movies The Empress of Floreana and The Galápagos Affair: Satan Came to Eden. Ecuadorian laws provided all colonists with the possibility of receiving twenty hectares each of free land, the right to maintain their citizenship, freedom from taxation for the first ten years in Galápagos, and the right to hunt and fish freely on all uninhabited islands where they might settle.^[65] The first European colonists to arrive were Norwegians who settled briefly on Floreana, before moving on to San Cristobal and Santa Cruz. A few years later, other colonists from Europe, America and Ecuador started arriving on the islands, seeking a simpler life.^[66] Descendants of the Norwegian Kastdalen family and the German Angermeyer still live on the islands.

During World War II, Ecuador authorized the United States to establish a naval base in Baltra Island, and radar stations in other strategic locations. Baltra was established as a United States Army Air Force base. Baltra was given the name of "Beta Base" along with "Alpha Base" in Nicaragua and "Gamma Base" in Salinas (continental Ecuador). The Crews stationed at Baltra and the aforementioned locations established a geographic triangle of protection in charge of patrolling the Pacific for enemy submarines, and also provided protection for the Panama Canal. After the war, the facilities were given to the government of Ecuador. Today, the island continues as an official Ecuadorian military base. The foundations and other remains of the US base can still be seen as one crosses the island. In 1946, a penal colony was established on Isabela Island, but it was suspended in 1959.

Galápagos National Park was established in 1959,^[67] with tourism starting to expand in the 1960s, imposing several restrictions upon the human population already living on the island. However, opportunities in the tourism, fishing, and farming industries attracted a mass of poor fishermen and farmers from mainland Ecuador. In the 1990s and 2000s, violent confrontations between parts of the local population and the Galápagos National Park Service occurred, including capturing and killing giant tortoises and holding staff of the Galápagos National Park Service hostage to obtain higher annual sea cucumber quotas.^[68]

21st century

In May 2023, Credit Suisse said it would buy Ecuador's debt of $1.6 billion in a "Debt-for-nature swap". It will sell 2035 and 2040 bonds for Galapagos conservation at a reduced issue price. The U.S. International Development Finance Corporation insures the deal, ^[69] which per Reuters was "in the works for more than a year", predating UBS takeover of Credit Suisse.^[70]

Politics

The islands are administered as Ecuador's Galápagos Province, established by presidential decree on 18 February 1973 during the administration of Guillermo Rodríguez Lara. The province is divided into three cantons, each covering groups of islands. The capital is Puerto Baquerizo Moreno.

Demographics

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The largest ethnic group is composed of Ecuadorian Mestizos, the mixed descendants of Spanish colonists and indigenous Native Americans, who arrived mainly in the last century from the continental part of Ecuador. Some descendants of the early European and American colonists on the islands also still remain on the islands.

In 1959, approximately 1,000 to 2,000 people called the islands their home. In 1972 a census in the archipelago recorded a population of 3,488. By the 1980s, this number had risen to more than 15,000 people, and in 2010 there were 25,124 people in the Galápagos. 2021 projected population was 40,685.^[71]

Five of the islands are inhabited: Baltra, Floreana, Isabela, San Cristóbal, and Santa Cruz.

Travel

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Options for air travel to the Galápagos are limited to two islands: San Cristobal (San Cristóbal Airport) and Baltra (Seymour Airport).^[72] Private aircraft must use Baltra as it is the airport equipped with overnight plane accommodations. Seymour Airport on Baltra was recently renovated (2012–2013) to accommodate larger planes.

Until 1969 the only way to visit was on a private or chartered vessel. There was no regular air service until Forrest Nelson's Hotel Galápagos began the first organized tours in April 1969. Soon other travel companies brought in tour ships and yachts, and local fishermen began converting their wooden boats for rudimentary cruising with guests. These vessels were the main source of overnight accommodations in the Galápagos.^[73] Today there are about 85 yachts and ships equipped for overnight guests. In 2006 the Baltra military governed island, was opened up to limited overnight camping. Baltra also requires permits by the military government for overnight stays on the beach. Other inhabited islands also allow camping on the beaches designated as "recreational" use to the locals. All of these camping permits are limited to number of people and nights, with most nights not to exceed three.

Land based hotels are opening on the inhabited islands of San Cristobal, Santa Cruz, Floreana and Isabela. By 2012, more than half the visitors to Galápagos made their tours using day boats and these small hotels. Restaurants, easy access and economy make this an attractive travel option.

There are only 116 visitor sites in the Galápagos: 54 land sites and 62 scuba-diving or snorkeling sites. Small groups are allowed to visit in 2- to 4-hour shifts only, to limit impact on the area. All groups are accompanied by licensed guides.

Environmental protection policy

Though the first protective legislation for the Galápagos was enacted in 1930 and supplemented in 1936, it was not until the late 1950s that positive action was taken to control what was happening to the native flora and fauna. In 1955, the International Union for the Conservation of Nature organized a fact-finding mission to the Galápagos. Two years later, in 1957, UNESCO, in cooperation with the government of Ecuador, sent another expedition to study the conservation situation and choose a site for a research station.

In 1959, the centenary year of

• Galápagos dove, Zenaida galapagoensis, two subspecies
• Galápagos flycatcher, Myiarchus magnirostris
• Galápagos land iguanas, Conolophus spp.
• Marine iguana, Amblyrhynchus cristatus, the only iguana feeding in the sea
• Galápagos tortoise (Galápagos giant tortoise), Chelonoidis nigra, known as galápago in Spanish, it gave the name to the islands
• green turtle
• Galápagos racer, Pseudalsophis biserialis, an endemic species of snake with two subspecies
• Sea cucumbers, the cause of environmental battles with fishermen over quotas
  of this expensive Asian delicacy
• Flightless cormorant, Phalacrocorax harrisi
• Great frigatebird and magnificent frigatebird
• Blue-footed booby, Sula nebouxii, popular among visitors for their large blue feet which they show off in courtship
• Galápagos penguin
  , Spheniscus mendiculus, the only living tropical penguin
• Waved albatross, Phoebastria irrorata, the only living tropical albatross
• Galápagos hawk, Buteo galapagoensis, the islands' main scavenger (at the top of the food chain
  ) and "environmental police"
• Four
  Galápagos mockingbirds
  , the first species Darwin noticed to vary from island to island
• Thirteen endemic species of tanagers, popularly called Darwin's finches. Among them is the sharp-beaked ground finch Geospiza difficilis septentrionalis which is sometimes called the "vampire finch" for its blood-sucking habits, and the tool-using woodpecker finch, Camarhynchus pallidus
• Galápagos sea lions, Zalophus wollebaeki, closely related to the California sea lion, but smaller
• Two endemic genera of cacti, each with a single species: Jasminocereus thouarsii, the candelabra cactus, and Brachycereus nesioticus, the lava cactus

Environmental threats

Introduced plants and animals, such as feral goats, cats, and cattle, brought accidentally or willingly to the islands by humans, represent the main threat to Galápagos.^[76] Quick to reproduce and with no natural predators, these alien species decimated the habitats of native species. The native animals, lacking natural predators on the islands, are defenseless to introduced predators.

There are over 700 introduced plant species today. There are only 500 native and endemic species. This difference is creating a major problem for the islands and the natural species that inhabit them. These plants have invaded large areas and eliminated endemic species in the humid zones of San Cristobal, Floreana, Isabela and Santa Cruz. Some of the most harmful introduced plants are the guayaba or

Many species were introduced to the Galápagos by

In 2007, UNESCO put the Galápagos Islands on their List of World Heritage in Danger because of threats posed by invasive species, unbridled tourism and overfishing.^[87] On 29 July 2010, the World Heritage Committee decided to remove the Galápagos Islands from the list because the Committee found significant progress had been made by Ecuador in addressing these problems.^[88]

On 28 January 2008, Galápagos National Park official Victor Carrion announced 53 sea lions (13 pups, 25 youngsters, 9 males and 6 females) were killed at the Galápagos Islands nature reserve on Pinta, with their heads caved in. In 2001, poachers killed 35 male sea lions.^[89]

The Galápagos Islands were short-listed as a candidate to be one of the

The islands' biodiversity is under threat from several sources. The human population is growing at a rate of 8% per year (1995). Introduced species have caused damage, and in 1996 a US$5 million, five-year eradication plan commenced in an attempt to rid the islands of introduced species such as goats, rats, deer, and donkeys. Except for the rats, the project was essentially completed in 2006.[81]^[82] Rats have only been eliminated from the smaller Galápagos Islands of Rábida and Pinzón.^[91]

• List of birds of the Galápagos Islands
• List of animals in the Galápagos Islands
• Galápagos National Park
• Galápagos hotspot
• Galápagos Islands xeric scrub
• Galápagos Province
• Darwin's Arch
• Johanna Angermeyer, author of various books featuring the Galápagos Islands

Notes

References

Citations

Bibliography

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  .
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  ISBN 978-0691142104
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• Halls, Monty (2020), My Family and the Galapagos, London: Headline Publishing,
  ISBN 9781472268815
  .
• Heyerdahl, Thor; et al. (1956), Memoir 12: Archaeological Evidence of Pre-Spanish Visits to the Galápagos Islands, Society for American Archaeology.
• Jackson, Michael Hume (1993), Galapagos: A Natural History, Calgary: University of Calgary Press.
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  Cambridge
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  ISBN 978-0-396-06576-0
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• Perry, Roger (1984), "The Islands and Their History", Key Environments: Galápagos, Oxford: Pergamon Press, pp. 1–14.
• Porter, D. (1822), Journal of a Cruise Made to the Pacific Ocean.

Further reading

• Black, Juan (1973), Galápagos, Archipiélago del Ecuador (in Spanish), Quito{{citation}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link), a comprehensive monograph by a former officer of the Galápagos National Park financed by the World Wildlife Fund and the Charles Darwin Foundation for the Galápagos Islands
• Müller, Bodo; et al. (2003), Galápagos: Die Verwunschenen Inseln (in German), BLV,
  ISBN 3-86108-909-2
  .
• Quammen, David (1996), The Song of the Dodo, New York: Touchstone.
• Romero, Simon (4 October 2009), "To Protect Galápagos, Ecuador Limits a Two-Legged Species", The New York Times, New York{{citation}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link).
• Wittmer, Margret (1961), Floreana: A Woman's Pilgrimage to the Galápagos, Travel Book Club, a memoir written by the matriarch of the first family to successfully inhabit Floreana, settling there in 1932.

External links

Wikisource has the text of the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica article "Galapagos Islands".

• Media related to Galapagos at Wikimedia Commons
• Galapagos Islands travel guide from Wikivoyage
• "Galápagos Islands xeric scrub". Terrestrial Ecoregions. World Wildlife Fund.
• Galápagos geology, with general information on the Galápagos Islands