Arnold Zwicky's Blog

Time to go to the beach. On Culebra, from Wikipedia:

Isla Culebra (… “Snake Island”) is an island-municipality of Puerto Rico. It is located approximately 17 miles (27 km) east of the Puerto Rican mainland, 12 miles (19 km) west of St. Thomas and 9 miles (14 km) north of Vieques. Culebra is spread over 5 wards and Culebra Pueblo (Dewey), the downtown area and the administrative center of the city. Residents of the island are known as Culebrenses. With a population of 1,818 as of the latest census, it is Puerto Rico’s least populous municipality.

The place wins some kind of prize for being the least populous municipality in P.R.! But it embraces even smaller places.

… Culebra is an archipelago consisting of the main island and twenty-three smaller islands that lie off its coast. ,,, Culebra is characterized by an irregular topography resulting in a long intricate shoreline. The island is approximately 7 by 5 miles (11 by 8 km). The coast is marked by cliffs, sandy coral beaches and mangrove forests.

Culebra has many beautiful beaches, including Flamenco Beach (Playa Flamenco)

… These small islands are all classified as nature reserves and several nature reserves also exist on the main island. One of the oldest bird sanctuaries in United States territory was established in Culebra on February 27, 1909 by President Teddy Roosevelt. The Culebra Island Giant Anole (Anolis roosevelti, Xiphosurus roosevelti …) is an extremely rare or possibly extinct lizard of the Anolis genus. It is native to Culebra Island and was named in honor of Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., who was the governor of Puerto Rico at that time.

(On anoles, see this posting.)

There are bird sanctuaries on many of the islands as well as turtle nesting sites on Culebra. Leatherback, green sea and hawksbill sea turtles use the beaches for nesting. The archipelagos bird sanctuaries are home to brown boobies, laughing gulls, sooty terns, bridled terns and noddy terns. An estimated 50,000 sea birds find their way back to the sanctuaries every year. These nature reserves comprise 1,568 acres (6.35 km²) of the archipelago’s 7,000 acres (28 km²).

… Culebra is a popular weekend tourist destination for Mainland Puerto Ricans, Americans and residents of Vieques.

This entry was posted on August 8, 2015 at 4:55 am and is filed under Language and animals, Names. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.