Prince Edward Islands

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Prince Edward Islands
Satellite image of the archipelago
Satellite image of the archipelago
Waters Indian Ocean
Geographical location 46 ° 46 ′  S , 37 ° 51 ′  E Coordinates: 46 ° 46 ′  S , 37 ° 51 ′  E
Map of Prince Edward Islands
Number of islands 2
Main island Marion Island
Total land area 335 km²
Residents 50 (ward staff)
Map of the Prince Edward Islands
Map of the Prince Edward Islands
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The Prince Edward Islands ( English Prince Edward Islands , also referred to as Prince Edward and Marion Islands by the German Foreign Office ) are an island group in the southern Indian Ocean near the Atlantic-Indian Ridge, about halfway through, except for one station between South Africa and the Antarctic , around 1770 km southeast of Port Elizabeth . The islands belong to the South African province of Western Cape .

geography

The group consists of two islands about 21 km apart, the eponymous Prince Edward Island (45 km²) and Marion Island (290 km²). Both islands are of volcanic origin and geologically very young with an age of less than 500,000 years. The volcanoes are still active; the last eruptions on Marion Island occurred in 1980 and 2004. The highest point on the islands is the 1230 meter high Mascarin Peak on Marion Island. Due to its southern location, the summit region of Mascarin Peak was glaciated until recently; as a result of the warming of the climate over the past few decades, the ice field seems to have disappeared.

climate

The Prince Edward Islands are located in the middle of the Roaring Forties , which are responsible for a permanent, often strong west wind with a lot of precipitation and little sunshine. The number of rainy days per year is 317 (about 26 per month), with the average annual rainfall between 2,400 and 3,000 mm. Due to its location near the Antarctic Convergence , the average water and air temperatures are only a few degrees above zero all year round (7.5 ° C in summer, 3.6 ° C in winter). The Antarctic pack ice does not reach the archipelago in winter, but icebergs are not uncommon in the waters around the archipelago.

history

The islands were first sighted on March 4, 1663 by the Dutch navigator Barend Barendszoon Lam ; However, since this gave the wrong coordinates, they could not be found again. It was not until over a century later, on January 13, 1772, that they were rediscovered by the French Marc-Joseph Marion du Fresne during his search for the southern continent ( Terra Australis ) ; the larger of the two islands is named after him today. He spent five days trying unsuccessfully to land there, and continued his journey east after discovering that instead of a continent he had found only two small islands. In 1776 his expedition, which after the death of du Fresne was now led by his deputy, Jules Crozet , met James Cook in Cape Town . Cook then set course for the islands, sighted them on December 12, 1776, but was also unable to land due to the bad weather conditions. He gave them the current name Prince Edward Islands, after Prince Edward , the fourth son of the British King and father of the future Queen Victoria .

The first documented landing took place in 1803 by a group of seal hunters who, however, found traces of previous residents, probably also seal hunters.

James Clark Ross visited the islands in 1840 but was unable to land either. The islands were finally surveyed in 1873 as part of the Challenger Expedition under Captain George Nares .

The British government granted a William Newton the rights to mine guano deposits for the next 21 years in 1908 and a 10-year seal hunt license to a sealing company in 1926.

The area was on December 29, 1947 (Marion Island) and on January 4, 1948 (Prince Edward Island) annexed with the approval of Britain's South Africa and belongs to the province since 1994, Western Cape ( Western Cape ). In February 1948, a permanent station was set up on the northeast coast of Marion Island, which primarily has an important position in sub-Antarctic meteorological research, but also serves astronomical and atmospheric research. Today, local human scientific research is severely limited after human-introduced rats and cats caused great damage to the bird population from the 1950s to the 1970s.

In the vicinity of the Prince Edward Islands on September 22, 1979 an event known as the " Vela incident " took place, which was interpreted as an explosion and which may therefore have been a joint nuclear weapon test by South Africa and Israel .

Nature reserve

The islands are breeding grounds for the sub-Antarctic fur seals and the southern elephant seal and breeding grounds for around 30,000 albatrosses , several hundred thousand petrels and more than a million penguins , especially king penguins . The dark shearwater and the black albatross are considered endangered species . There are also numerous endemic species of plants and invertebrates. In 1995 the islands were declared a nature reserve. The bird protection organization BirdLife International has designated the archipelago as an Important Bird Area (ZA101).

In 1949 five house cats were brought to Marion Island to combat a mouse plague in the station. However, the cats reproduced quickly, and in 1977 there were about 3,400 cats on the island, which ate petrels instead of mice, so that the birds on the island were threatened with extinction. Some species of petrels have in fact already died out on Marion Island, and so a " feline extermination program " was launched: some cats were infected with a highly specific disease called Feline Panleucopenia , bringing the number of cats to around in 1982 600 reduced. The remaining cats were killed by night hunting, and in 1991 only eight cats could be caught in twelve months. It is believed that there are no more cats on Marion Island these days. As a result, however, the mice population has increased massively, so that an eradication program for mice is now also being planned.

On April 9, 2013, the South African government declared the archipelago with its 12-mile zone a Marine Protected Area through the Department of Water and Environmental Affairs . A protection under the national law of South Africa had already been announced in Government Gazette No. 32198. This was based on Section 43 of the Marine Living Resources Act ( Act No. 18/1998 ).

literature

  • Robert JM Crawford, John Cooper: Conserving Surface-nesting Seabirds at the Prince Edward Islands: The Roles of Research, Monitoring and Legislation . In: African Journal of Marine Science . tape 25 , no. 1 , 2003, ISSN  1814-232X , p. 415-426 , doi : 10.2989 / 18142320309504031 (English).

Web links

Commons : Prince Edward Islands  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Patrick G. Quilty: Origin and evolution of the sub-Antarctic islands: the foundation . In: Papers and Proceedings of the Royal Society of Tasmania . tape 141 , no. 1 . Royal Society of Tasmania, 2007, ISSN  0080-4703 , Marion and Prince Edward islands - the Prince Edward Islands Group, p. 49 (English, online [PDF; 1.3 MB ]). online ( Memento from March 5, 2016 in the Internet Archive )
  2. ^ Marion Island - Eruptive History. In: Global Volcanism Program. Smithsonian Institution , accessed May 17, 2017 .
  3. ↑ Jeffrey S. Kargel et al. (Ed.): Global Land Ice Measurements from Space . Springer, Berlin / Heidelberg 2014, ISBN 978-3-540-79817-0 , 33.3.7 Glacier change in the Southern Ocean Super-Region, p. 806–807 , doi : 10.1007 / 978-3-540-79818-7 (English, can be downloaded from Springer Extra Materials ).
  4. ^ Marion Island - History. South African National Antarctic Program (SANAP), archived from the original on July 24, 2017 ; accessed on May 17, 2017 (English).
  5. ^ John Cooper, Robert K. Headland: A history of South African involvement in Antarctica and at the Prince Edward Islands . In: South African Journal of Antarctic Research . tape 21 , no. 2 , 1991, p. 77–91 (English, available online from the Stellenbosch University library [PDF; 935 kB ]).
  6. ↑ Important Bird Areas factsheet: Prince Edward Islands Special Nature Reserve. In: BirdLife Data Zone. BirdLife International , accessed May 17, 2017 .
  7. ^ Marion Island's plague of mice | IOL News . ( iol.co.za [accessed November 29, 2018]).
  8. ^ Prince Edward Islands declared a Marine Protected Area. In: Media Releases. Department of Environmental Affairs, Republic of South Africa, April 9, 2013, accessed May 17, 2017 .
  9. ^ Marine Living Resources Act, 1998 (Act No. 18 of 1998): Draft Notice declaring the Prince Edward Islands Marine Protected Area . Notice 421 of 2009. In: Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (Ed.): Government Gazette . No. 32198 , May 8, 2009, p. 125 f . (English, online [PDF; 78 kB ; accessed on May 17, 2017]).