Pedras Tinhosas is a small

archipelago An archipelago ( ), sometimes called an island group or island chain, is a chain, cluster, or collection of islands, or sometimes a sea containing a small number of scattered islands. Examples of archipelagos include: the Indonesian Arc ...

of two

islet An islet is a very small, often unnamed island. Most definitions are not precise, but some suggest that an islet has little or no vegetation and cannot support human habitation. It may be made of rock, sand and/or hard coral; may be permanen ...

s, Tinhosa Grande and Tinhosa Pequena, south-west of the island of

Príncipe Príncipe is the smaller, northern major island of the country of São Tomé and Príncipe lying off the west coast of Africa in the Gulf of Guinea. It has an area of (including offshore islets) and a population of 7,324 at the 2012 Census;

in the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

. Since 2012, it has formed part of UNESCO's Island of Príncipe Biosphere Reserve, which includes the island of Príncipe and the surrounding islets.

Environment

Both islets are covered with brushwood, and serve as a nesting ground for a wide variety of

sea The sea, connected as the world ocean or simply the ocean, is the body of salty water that covers approximately 71% of the Earth's surface. The word sea is also used to denote second-order sections of the sea, such as the Mediterranean Sea, ...

bird Birds are a group of warm-blooded vertebrates constituting the class Aves (), characterised by feathers, toothless beaked jaws, the laying of hard-shelled eggs, a high metabolic rate, a four-chambered heart, and a strong yet lightweig ...

s, including '' Anous stolidus'', '' Anous minutus'', '' Onychoprion fuscatus'', white-tailed tropic bird ('' Phaethon lepturus'') and the brown booby (''Sula leucogaster''). The islets have been recognised as an Important Bird Area (IBA) by BirdLife International for their

seabird Seabirds (also known as marine birds) are birds that are adapted to life within the marine environment. While seabirds vary greatly in lifestyle, behaviour and physiology, they often exhibit striking convergent evolution, as the same enviro ...

colonies In modern parlance, a colony is a territory subject to a form of foreign rule. Though dominated by the foreign colonizers, colonies remain separate from the administration of the original country of the colonizers, the '' metropolitan state'' ...

References

Uninhabited islands of São Tomé and Príncipe Ramsar sites in São Tomé and Príncipe Príncipe Important Bird Areas of São Tomé and Príncipe Seabird colonies {{SaoTomePrincipe-geo-stub