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¡Hola a todos!
In this second entry concerning the Galapagos Islands, I shall talk a little – well, perhaps more than a little – about the land animals, flora and geological information that I saw and learnt so much about: my reasoning is that by far my favourite experiences occurred in the water and so I want to save the best for last! Of course, everything truly was very special, but, I hold a particular soft spot for those fabulous aquatic adventures.
In fact, as I look back over the copious notes that I scribbled while journeying around the Islands (oh yes, I made notes and proud of the fact I am, too), it occurs to me that I actually saw very few animals that can reasonably fall under my ‘land’ grouping. Hence, I shall commence with some descriptions of flora and geological features before continuing my method highlighted above, saving the best for last.
Galapagos is home to more than just a fabulous array of animals covering land, sea and air, it also boasts an interesting and diverse range of plants and trees, made remarkable by their habits and sheer tenacious ability in being able to survive in such seemingly harsh conditions. During our beach-landing at Floreana Island, Monica pointed out to us a mangrove tree, the first of many that we observed throughout the remainder of our trip. This tree was growing on the beach, in sand at the water’s edge. Quite fascinatingly, this tree has adapted to survive upon salt water, boasting the ability to desalinate – to excrete the expendable excess salt – through the stoma in its leaves. Some of this particular mangrove’s roots were actually in the water! On other occasions I witnessed strange mangrove trees with roots growing downwards from branches, stretching towards the water, shaping odd prison-like cage structures at the water’s surface. On the same walk, we later met a few scalesia trees, which have notably hairy limbs but, were otherwise leafless and seemingly lifeless, visiting as we were during the Islands’ dry season. However, for the other six months of the year, when the rains come, these apparently deceased trees erupt back into vibrant, verdant life as new foliage shoots forth.
Our walk inland from Urvina Bay, Isabela Island upon the sixth day brought with it a memorable experience. Crowding the sides of the path as we journeyed inland were numerous cordia trees, also known – quite appropriately – as glue-berry trees. This tree is native to Galapagos and its seeds are the hardest of any tree found upon the archipelago: no bird is able to crack them, although mockingbirds do swallow them whole. The tree’s berries contain a sticky substance, to the touch not dissimilar to glue. This “glue” is used by the locals resident in the habitable zone of Isabela, as well as those upon the colonized islands of Santa Cruz and Cristobal, as hair gel. It was also used, on one memorable occasion, by yours truly! Encouraged by various companions and especially by Jess, who transpired to be a rather talented stylist, I sat upon my rock seat and became thoroughly contented as she messed with my hair. The result was spectacular, certainly: I have not received a hair-cut since a rather terrifying experience in Buenos Aires some five months previously, when I came dangerously close to being scalped. I was never particularly interested in the various punk and post-punk styles but, I can at least now boast of having once sported a Mohawk… of sorts!
Crossing the surreal lava landscape around Moreno Point on Isabela Island, we encountered a lava cactus. This pioneer plant boasts orange sections of plant growing atop the more natural green. This orange denotes the current year’s growth, while the green that of previous ones. The cactus is dormant until the rainy season, when it grows anew, much like the aforementioned scalesia tree (and, in fact, various other plants, trees and shrubs resident upon Galapagos). The lava cactus’ flowers bloom in the evening and overnight to avoid over-exposure to the light of the sun. While on this walk, we also learnt more about the lava upon which we trod. The lava floe in this instance had flowed from the nearby Cerro Azul. It had remained earth-bound over the course of its journey and therefore the gas within the magma had been trapped inside, even after the magma had cooled and solidified. Thus the rock today is very dense and remarkably heavy when lifted. This rock stands in juxtaposition to that discovered on the beaches of Floreana, around the first mangrove tree, mentioned above. In that episode, the lava rocks were blown airbourne out of the exploding caldera, during which time gas was forced out of the projectiles. Thus the remaining rock shell is often hollow and surprisingly light.
The geology of Galapagos, therefore, is no less mind-blowing. The Galapagos Islands are born and they die, just as with any other land-mass on this planet but, the real interest is in the relatively speedy process particular to these lands. The Islands are formed from a volcanic hotspot located to the north-west, currently almost directly below the most westerly of the earthen creations, Fernandina Island. Molten lava sprews forth from a massive underwater vent, where it meets the far colder liquid and swiftly cools, solidifying into igneous rock. In time, this lava tower grows and grows until eventually it breaks the ocean’s surface and a new island is formed. As might be expected from such persistent volcanic activity, the Nasca tectonic plate upon which the Islands sit is in constant motion, sliding ever to the south-east. Indeed, it is the past movement of this plate that gave rise to the Andean mountain range. The volcanic hotspot does not move with it and so the vent remains fixed, even as the Islands slowly, ever so slowly, creep away from the active centre at a speed of approximately one inch every year.
This “geological conveyor-belt” helps to explain the obvious variation among the Islands. The oldest, Espiñola and Floreana, lie to the south-east, at the furthest points from the hotspot, while Fernandina – the youngest – may have be in existence only for some 30,000 years, a relative baby in geological terms. Due to their relatively close proximity to the hotspot, Fernandina and Isabela are the most volcanically active of the Islands: ‘La Cumbre’ (literally, ‘The Summit’) upon Fernandina erupted as recently as April this year and a monstrous movement in 2005 unleashed so much lava that as it cooled some of it actually added land-mass to the isle, an occurrence reminiscent of when Mount Vesuvius buried the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, during which the neighbouring Amalfi coastline was completely altered by the flow of the cooling lava. By complete contrast, the nearby central island of Santa Cruz has moved sufficiently far from the active hotspot that its volcanoes have long since grown dormant, their calderas now covered with greenery and home to an array of winged creatures and ground beasts. Thus it transpires that as an island moves ever further from the active centre, its own decrease in activity in fact gives rise to a wider, more diverse array of life.
As an island moves, it blossoms into diversity and encourages life to flourish. Nonetheless, everything remains in flux and eventually this situation of flourishing ecosystems is brought to a halt. The Islands can , and do, move too far. The oldest island of the existing Galapagos archipelago, Espiñola, is dying. It has moved outside the microclimate necessary for harbouring life from the smallest seed to the largest creature. On the isle itself, a mere handful of incredibly hardy plant species remain while the sea-life surrounding the land-mass is given one last breath by the Humboldt Current, arriving with cold water from the Antarctic in which sea-lions, fish and various other marine-beings continue to frequent. Espiñola has travelled some 100 miles in three and a half million years, cooling, fracturing, fragmenting, before finally, eventually, sinking back beneath the waves. This process has been repeating itself for millenia: Espiñola is not the first, nor will it be the last, island to suffer this fate – indeed, geological surveys have revealed a host of raised masses beneath the waves, located between the current archipelago and the Ecuadorian mainland, Galapagoses of previous ages. It was a sobering thought, as I sat contemplating the inevitable fate that awaits even the seemingly ageless earth upon which we tread: the Galapagos Islands themselves, as with my trip to them, are transient. Yet this pondering was positive also: the circle continues, endures in new creations and so we carry on, hopeful of providing something of the encouragement for life, the entertainment for others offered by Galapagos, while perhaps moving slightly more quickly.
The notable land creature during the trip, indeed one of the most iconic of all the Galapagos residents, was the Giant Tortoise, of course. As I learnt swiftly, the word ‘tortoise’ denotes those shelled creatures that reside upon land, while a ‘turtle’ is a marine animal. The tortoises boast also an enviable history as the source of inspiration for the name ‘Galapagos’. This word means “saddles” in Spanish and it was explorers from this European land, upon landing at the Islands and seeing the huge tortoises with their curious beaked shells, who shouted “Galapagos!” The archipelago has been known by many names down the years but, it is this endearing term that has endured.
The tortoises predominantly inhabit Santa Cruz Island and so it was to this land that we voyaged and explored on our fourth day. Santa Cruz is home to the Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF) research station, responsible chiefly for the support of various endangered animals inhabiting Galapagos, tortoises among them. CDF was established in 1959 under the auspices of UNESCO and the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources. The station boasts a strong breeding programme, concentrating upon the tortoises themselves. There remain fourteen species of tortoise endemic to Galapagos, each resident upon a different island, where slightly altered circumstances have led to small changes in each of the species, aiding differentiation and categorization. The decline in tortoise numbers since records were first penned by sea-voyagers some two hundred years or more has been a particular concern for the Foundation. The introduction to the Islands of harmful and competing elements, perhaps none moreso than humanity itself, has led to a dramatic fall in estimated population sizes. Where historians have projected that there were once as many as 250,000 tortoises inhabiting the Galapagos Islands, counts in the late 1980s revealed that the figure had fallen to approximately 15,000. Today a programme is underway to try to increase this paltry figure and recent counts suggest that the labours of the CDF and its army of volunteers is bearing fruit: latest surveys have put the number around 25,000 or so.
A main component in the increase in numbers is the breeding programme itself. Tortoise nesting sites are monitored during the breeding season. Shortly after a female has laid her eggs, before burying them and then deserting them (it’s a hard life indeed for a newly-born tortoise), volunteers remove the eggs from their nest, relocating them in carefully controlled incubators within the research station on Santa Cruz. Precise records are kept, ascertaining from which island each young tortoise came and when. The eggs are incubated until they hatch, after which time the young tortoises are reared with fellow members of their particular species in pens, fed and watered every day. Observing these little ones at play (albeit especially lethargic-looking play) while visiting the station was very enjoyable: the youngsters often ended up on their shells after various ill-attempted manoeuvers, a position in which they can remain stranded for hours. The tortoises are invariably left to their own devices in this time, being allowed space in which to test themselves and, however unknowingly, prepare for life in the wild. After five years, most tortoises are deemed to be old enough and large enough for release back into nature upon their specific island. Every tortoise that is released is first implanted with an electronic chip that allows for accurate future location, enabling observation efforts to continue as the individual grows and matures.
Another factor encouraging the increase in tortoise numbers has been ther concerted efforts of the CDF to eradicate harmful species that have been introduced to the archipelago, deliberately or otherwise. Many such threats arrived as interlopers aboard visiting ships, such as rats and mice; others came as pets, included among this number are cats and dogs; still more were once live-stock, such as pigs and goats. Finally, some creatures may have arrived from the mainland on driftwood. In most of these cases, humans have played at least an indirect role in threatening the livelihood of these tortoises and it seems particularly appropriate that humans now form one of the tortoises’ strongest ties to survival. The introduction of these foreign species has been disastrous for the tortoises: rats, for example, are able to eat through the soft, immature carpaces (shells) of young tortoises, after which they eat the tortoise inside – the unfortunate victim is eaten alive, quite literally. Feral creatures – animals that were once domestic but, are now wild – are a problem as well. Pigs are able to locate tortoise nests using their fine sense of smell, dig up the eggs and eat every last one.
These threats are still very serious and they are treated as such by the CDF and its associates. Indeed, upon multiple occasions we asked various representatives what they thought the Foundation’s greatest achievement was and a familiar story began to emerge. It is a well-known success story within the CDF that feral goats have now been completely eliminated from the northern half of Isabela Island, a considerable area. The methods adopted have given their users particular cause for celebration and remain a source of pride. Many of the goats were shot and killed by hunters; the few survivors were destroyed after the Foundation adopted a special technique introduced from New Zealand, where it had enjoyed considerable success. A neutered, chipped male goat was released into the region and then tracked. He rendezvoused, quite naturally, quite innocently, with the surviving others, after which the hunters moved in once more, tracking this male, to finish the job. Quite appropriately, this chipped male was named “Judas”, the name also given to the technique itself.
Our visit to the research station culminated in a brief sighting of the complex’s most famous resident, ‘Lonesome George’. The sole remaining survivor of his particular species, ‘Pinta’, named after the island from which he originates, George is remarkably old (perhaps 150 years or more – he may even have met Darwin!). His DNA has been sampled and is kept in secure storage but, efforts are ongoing to encourage him to mate and thus ensure the natural continuity of his species. Two females of a species similar to his own have been introduced to his pen: last year eggs were recovered but, none survived. George is huge indeed and it was something of a marvel to come close to such history.
The same afternoon, we journeyed into the highland interior of Santa Cruz, to observe some of the island’s particular species of giant tortoise in the wild, in adulthood. Long before disembarking at our bus’ destination, I spotted tortoises from my window, roaming free in fields and beside mud-hut dwellings: it was fascinating to watch them move ponderously through the grass, grazing contentedly. The tortoises are remarkable indeed: their longevity has already been mentioned. Furthermore, they are capable of surviving a full year with neither food nor water; hence their being such desirable food-staples aboard the ships departing from the Islands in years gone by, when fresh water especially was so coveted and could in this instance be reserved solely for the crew. Female tortoises have no voicebox but, males do and occasionally they use them to produce a deep, guttural grunt not dissimilar to the lowing of a cow. The vibrations that carry through their carpaces upon the articulation of this grunt is thought to stimulate females during the act of mating.
Once again, I was left in a reflective state after visiting these remarkable creatures – indeed, I am pensive even writing up my notes at this juncture. That such creatures exist, such living history that we can continue to appreciate up close and personal is a joy to experience. That I am able to experience such joy is thrilling and I am reminded once more of my blessed luck and good fortune in this: there are many travellers that I have met, previously and subsequent to my trip, that have not or more appropriately cannot contemplate such an undertaking, largely due to the costs involved. I am sure that I cannot hope to live to 150 years of age but, I am grateful nonetheless for being given the opportunity to meet some of those special creatures who may and for being able to savour such an experience for all that it was in my mind, personally.
¡Saludos a todos!
David xxx
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