The Snares Islands / Tini Heke, known colloquially as The Snares, is a group of uninhabited islands lying about 200 km south of
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
's
South Island
The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman ...
and to the south-southwest of
Stewart Island / Rakiura
Stewart Island ( mi, Rakiura, ' glowing skies', officially Stewart Island / Rakiura) is New Zealand's third-largest island, located south of the South Island, across the Foveaux Strait. It is a roughly triangular island with a total land ar ...
. The Snares consist of the main
North East Island and the smaller
Broughton Island as well as the
Western Chain Islands some to the west-southwest. Collectively, the Snares have a total land area of .
The islands are listed with the
New Zealand Outlying Islands
The New Zealand outlying islands are nine offshore island groups that are part of New Zealand, with all but Solander Islands lying beyond the 12nm limit of the mainland's territorial waters. Although considered an integral parts of New Zealand ...
. The islands are an immediate part of New Zealand, not part of any
region
In geography, regions, otherwise referred to as zones, lands or territories, are areas that are broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and t ...
or
district
A district is a type of administrative division that, in some countries, is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or counties, several municipalities, subdivisions o ...
, but instead ''Area Outside Territorial Authority'', like all the other outlying islands except the
Solander Islands
The Solander Islands / Hautere are three uninhabited volcanic islets toward the western end of the Foveaux Strait just beyond New Zealand's South Island. The Māori name ''Hautere'' translates into English as "flying wind". The islands lie so ...
.
History
The island group was first sighted by Europeans on 23 November 1791 independently by the two ships
HMS ''Discovery'' under Captain
George Vancouver
Captain George Vancouver (22 June 1757 – 10 May 1798) was a British Royal Navy officer best known for his 1791–1795 expedition, which explored and charted North America's northwestern Pacific Coast regions, including the coasts of what a ...
, and
HMS ''Chatham'', commanded by Lieutenant
William R. Broughton, both of the
Vancouver Expedition
The Vancouver Expedition (1791–1795) was a four-and-a-half-year voyage of exploration and diplomacy, commanded by Captain George Vancouver of the Royal Navy. The British expedition circumnavigated the globe and made contact with five continen ...
. Vancouver named the islands "The Snares" because he considered them a shipping hazard; an islet east of the Western Chain bears the name Vancouver Rock, and the second largest island is named after Broughton.
In contrast to Vancouver, Broughton proposed the name "Knight's Island".
The islands were already known to the
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
, who called one of the larger islands ''Te Taniwha'' ("The sea-monster"). Unlike other
subantarctic islands that were greatly affected by the
whaling
Whaling is the process of hunting of whales for their usable products such as meat and blubber, which can be turned into a type of oil that became increasingly important in the Industrial Revolution.
It was practiced as an organized industry ...
and
sealing industry in the 19th century, the Snares remain one of the last pristine areas in New Zealand.
The Ngai Tahu Claims Settlement Act 1998 officially altered the name to "Snares Islands/Tini Heke" – one of many such changes under the
Ngāi Tahu
Ngāi Tahu, or Kāi Tahu, is the principal Māori (tribe) of the South Island. Its (tribal area) is the largest in New Zealand, and extends from the White Bluffs / Te Parinui o Whiti (southeast of Blenheim), Mount Mahanga and Kahurangi Poi ...
Treaty settlement.
Geography
The main island of the Snares group,
North East Island, as its name suggests, lies at the northeastern corner of the group. It has roughly the shape of a triangle, but with two concave edges, this causing both the southern and northwestern coast to be in the form of large irregular bays. Cliffs and reefs are found along the northeastern coast and part of the southern coast, with the islands highest point – rising to 130 metres – being located on the long westward-pointing finger which lies between them.
In contrast, the east coast is relatively flat and sloping, and provides the only easy access-point for landing, close to Station Point. Several small bays dot the east coast, among them Punui Bay, Ho Ho Bay, and Mollymawk Bay. The island's northernmost and southernmost points are the prosaically named North Promontory and South Promontory. Several small islets, the Daption Rocks, lie off the tip of North Promontory, and are the island group's northernmost point.
[NZMS 272/1+5 (1981) "Snares Islands and Bounty Islands", Wellington:NZ Government Department of Lands and Surveys.]
The group's second largest island,
Broughton Island, lies to the southeast of South Promontory. Steeply sloping, it is surrounded by cliffs, reefs and small islets on three sides, with only the northern side being relatively accessible.
The long finger on the western coast of the main island has several small islands located close to its tip. The largest of these, Alert Stack, is located to the south of the peninsula and separated from it by a narrow channel. The peninsula points almost directly towards the
Western Chain, a line of stacks located some 4 kilometres to the southwest of the main island. These islets are simply named Tahi, Rua, Toru, Wha, and Rima, the
Māori
Māori or Maori can refer to:
Relating to the Māori people
* Māori people of New Zealand, or members of that group
* Māori language, the language of the Māori people of New Zealand
* Māori culture
* Cook Islanders, the Māori people of the C ...
words for the numerals one to five. Between this chain and North East island lies the small stack of Vancouver Rock.
Environment
All of the Snares islands and their surrounding waters have been recognised as
Important Bird Area
An Important Bird and Biodiversity Area (IBA) is an area identified using an internationally agreed set of criteria as being globally important for the conservation of bird populations.
IBA was developed and sites are identified by BirdLife Int ...
s (IBAs) by
BirdLife International
BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding ...
for their significant seabird breeding populations. The eastern islands are notable for their
Snares penguin
The Snares penguin (''Eudyptes robustus''), also known as the Snares crested penguin and the Snares Islands penguin, is a penguin from New Zealand. The species breeds on the Snares Islands, a group of islands off the southern coast of the South ...
s,
Buller's albatrosses,
sooty shearwater
The sooty shearwater (''Ardenna grisea'') is a medium-large shearwater in the seabird family Procellariidae. In New Zealand, it is also known by its Māori name , and as muttonbird, like its relatives the wedge-tailed shearwater (''A. pacificus' ...
s,
mottled petrel
The mottled petrel (''Pterodroma inexpectata'') or kōrure is a species of seabird and a member of the gadfly petrels. It usually attains in length with a wingspan.
This species is highly pelagic, rarely approaching land, except to nest and r ...
s and
common diving petrel
The common diving petrel (''Pelecanoides urinatrix''), also known as the smaller diving petrel or simply the diving petrel, is a diving petrel, one of four very similar auk-like small petrels of the southern oceans. It is native to South Atlant ...
s, as well as of
Snares snipe
The Snares snipe (''Coenocorypha huegeli''), also known as the Snares Island snipe, or tutukiwi in Māori, is a species of bird in the sandpiper family, Scolopacidae.
Taxonomy and etymology
The Snares Island snipe is one of a group of birds of s ...
. The Western Chain hosts colonies of Snares penguins,
Salvin's, Buller's and
Chatham albatross
The Chatham albatross (''Thalassarche eremita''), also known as the Chatham mollymawk or Chatham Island mollymawk,Robertson, C. J. R. (2003) is a medium-sized black-and-white albatross which breeds only on The Pyramid, a large rock stack in th ...
es. The islands also provide a home to the
endemic
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsew ...
Snares tomtit, as well as to several endemic invertebrates such as ''
Grypotheca horningae
''Grypotheca horningae'' is a moth of the family Psychidae. It was described by John S. Dugdale in 1987. It is endemic to New Zealand and is only known from the Snares Islands. The species is named in honour of Carol J. Horning who collected the ...
''.
North East Island is forested and is the world's premier breeding area for the sooty shearwaters, with up to three million individuals being present during the breeding season (November–April). A dangerous reef (Seal Reef) lies ten kilometres to the south of the group.
Megaherb
Megaherbs are a group of herbaceous wildflowers growing in the New Zealand subantarctic islands and on the other subantarctic islands. They are characterised by their great size, with huge leaves and very large and often unusually coloured flowers ...
communities grow on the islands.
The islands enjoy a status of high protection and are rated by the New Zealand Department of Conservation as "minimum impact islands". Landing on the islands is generally prohibited or by special research permit only.
The area is among five subantarctic island groups forming the
New Zealand Subantarctic Islands
The New Zealand Subantarctic Islands comprise the five southernmost groups of the New Zealand outlying islands. They are collectively designated as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Most of the islands lie near the southeast edge of the largely ...
, designated as a
World Heritage Site
A World Heritage Site is a landmark or area with legal protection by an international convention administered by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). World Heritage Sites are designated by UNESCO for h ...
by UNESCO.
New Zealand Sub-Antarctic Islands - UNESCO World Heritage Centre
/ref>
See also
* List of Antarctic and subantarctic islands
* List of islands of New Zealand
New Zealand consists of more than six hundred islands, mainly remnants of a larger land mass now beneath the sea. New Zealand is the seventh-largest island nation on earth, and the third-largest located entirely in the Southern Hemisphere. T ...
* List of islands
This is a list of the lists of islands in the world grouped by country, by continent, by body of water
A body of water or waterbody (often spelled water body) is any significant accumulation of water on the surface of Earth or another plane ...
* Desert island
A desert island, deserted island, or uninhabited island, is an island, islet or atoll that is not permanently populated by humans. Uninhabited islands are often depicted in films or stories about shipwrecked people, and are also used as stereot ...
References
Birds Of the Snares Islands - New Zealand
Info and Map of the Snares Islands - New Zealand Department of Conservation
Expedition Snares Islands video – Te Papa
{{DEFAULTSORT:Snares
New Zealand subantarctic islands
Archipelagoes of New Zealand
Archipelagoes of the Southern Ocean
Subantarctic islands
Important Bird Areas of the Snares Islands
Temperate Australasia