The South-west Saint Helena Important Bird Area is a 45 km² tract of land covering about 37% of the island of Saint Helena, a British Overseas Territory in the South

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 ...

. It has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area (IBA) because it supports several

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'' ...

of breeding

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 ...

s, including the

red-billed tropicbird The red-billed tropicbird (''Phaethon aethereus'') is a tropicbird, one of three closely related species of seabird of tropical oceans. Superficially resembling a tern in appearance, it has mostly white plumage with some black markings on the wi ...

, as well as habitat of 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 else ...

, and critically endangered, Saint Helena plover.

Description

The site covers south-western Saint Helena, from Diana's Peak National Park to the mainly

basaltic Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90% of a ...

islets of Egg, Speery and Peaked Islands and other offshore stacks and rocks which support the seabird colonies. The four vegetation zones comprise an arid, eroded lowland below 350 m, an intermediate zone at 350–500 m of pasture and non-indigenous woodland, a moist highland zone characterised by

woodland A woodland () is, in the broad sense, land covered with trees, or in a narrow sense, synonymous with wood (or in the U.S., the ''plurale tantum'' woods), a low-density forest forming open habitats with plenty of sunlight and limited shade (se ...

and flax plantations and, at the highest point of the island, a small remnant area of native ''

Dicksonia ''Dicksonia'' is a genus of tree ferns in the order Cyatheales. It is regarded as related to ''Cyathea'', but is considered to retain more primitive traits, dating back at least to the Jurassic and Cretaceous periods. The fossil record includes ...

fern A fern (Polypodiopsida or Polypodiophyta ) is a member of a group of vascular plants (plants with xylem and phloem) that reproduce via spores and have neither seeds nor flowers. The polypodiophytes include all living pteridophytes exce ...

thicket and ''

Melanodendron ''Melanodendron'' is a genus of trees in the family Asteraceae, with only one species, ''Melanodendron integrifolium'' (black cabbage tree), native to the island of Saint Helena (South Atlantic Ocean). It is related to the Saint Helenan gumwoods ...

'' cabbage trees. . The coast is dominated by sea cliffs rising mainly to between 300–570 m. The islets are largely bare with some lichens and heavy guano deposits. There is an important fossil site at Sandy Bay.

Birds

Localities within the site include three Saint Helena plover breeding sites – Broad Bottom, Southern Pastures, and Man and Horse. Apart from red-billed tropicbirds, breeding seabirds include band-rumped storm petrels, Atlantic masked boobies, Atlantic sooty terns,

brown Brown is a color. It can be considered a composite color, but it is mainly a darker shade of orange. In the CMYK color model used in printing or painting, brown is usually made by combining the colors orange and black. In the RGB color model us ...

and black noddies,

white tern The white tern or common white tern (''Gygis alba'') is a small seabird found across the tropical oceans of the world. It is sometimes known as the fairy tern, although this name is potentially confusing as it is also the common name of '' Sternu ...

s and, possibly,

brown boobies The brown booby (''Sula leucogaster'') is a large seabird of the booby family Sulidae, of which it is perhaps the most common and widespread species. It has a pantropical range, which overlaps with that of other booby species. The gregarious brow ...

References

{{coord, 15, 59, S, 05, 45, W, type:landmark_region:SH, display=title Important Bird Areas of Saint Helena Geography of Saint Helena

Description

Birds

See also

References