Floreana island

A new island for us, Floreana, is one of the smaller islands. It  was the first to be occupied by the early visitors to Galapagos due to it having one of the few fresh water springs in the archipelago. Other islands now produce water but all from underground aquifers. 

The first inhabitants were apparently pirates who came for the water but made a base here in caves close to the spring. 

Other ships also called to resupply which unfortunately led to the islands native tortoise population being wiped out. Eventually a small permanent population developed growing their own  food and even trying to run an early tourist business. 

The early occupiers developed a post barrel, passing ships would stop here, they would leave any post they had and take any which was addressed  for their eventual destination.  In this way post would eventually be delivered.  There is now a replica post barrel,  we all wrote cards and left them, who knows what happens now but I expect it may involve a stamp and a long wait. 

These incomers brought their own domestic animals which further damaged the local wildlife population. 

Today there is a small population of about 150 people who fish, farm and cater for the tourists.  There has been a lot of work done in eradicating many of the invasive species,  they believe rats are now gone and animals like pigs, cows and donkeys are all domestic and contained to the farms. The land used for farming makes up a small part of the island, the rest is left for the natural environment. 

Over the last 20 years or so a breeding program for the believed extinct Floreana tortoise has been developed on one animal found as a pet and some they think escaped when they were taken away for food. The Darwin institute believe the new  Floreana tortoise is about 70% genetically identical to the original but as some interbreeding took place between the escaped tortoise and those on the islands they ended up on they will never be able to replace the original.  These tortoise are short necked with a low front to the shell as the food they eat on Floreana as available on the ground and they don't need to reach up high to browse. 

There has also recently been a release of several hundred Darwin Finch to try and repopulate the island.
We spent yesterday on the island tour, we were taken into the Highlands where we were shown the tortoise enclosure,  the oldest of these are only 20 and still need some protection and feeding,  they have a large walled enclosure of 1km square so are able to range as they would in the wild. We also explored the caves around the spring which were home to the earliest inhabitants. We were then taken to a farm and saw how ucca, banana, plantain and citrus fruits are grown. It seems very overgrown compared to the farms we know, more just a concentration of one crop in the jungle than a field but obviously works.

We then walked along the coast, here much of the sand is back as it is crumbled lava, and finished by snorkelling in a sheltered bay. Again we saw turtles,  octopus 🐙,  a small moray eel and huge shoals of fish.

We will probably move on tomorrow as this is only a tiny island and much of it is reserved and not accessible to us. Today we will explore the small town, swim and relax. 

Tim