Little Green Island is a

granite Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies un ...

island, with an area of , in south-eastern

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands. With an area of , Australia is the largest country by ...

. It is part of

Tasmania ) , nickname = , image_map = Tasmania in Australia.svg , map_caption = Location of Tasmania in AustraliaCoordinates: , subdivision_type = Country , subdi ...

’s Great Dog Island Group, lying in eastern

Bass Strait Bass Strait () is a strait separating the island states and territories of Australia, state of Tasmania from the Australian mainland (more specifically the coast of Victoria (Australia), Victoria, with the exception of the land border across Bo ...

between Flinders and

Cape Barren Island Cape Barren Island, officially truwana / Cape Barren Island, is a island in the Bass Strait, off the north east coast of Tasmania, Australia. It is the second largest island of the Furneaux Group; Flinders Island lies to the north, with th ...

s in the

Furneaux Group The Furneaux Group is a group of approximately 100 islands located at the eastern end of Bass Strait, between Victoria and Tasmania, Australia. The islands were named after British navigator Tobias Furneaux, who sighted the eastern side of ...

. It is partly a conservation area, and partly private property, used for

grazing In agriculture, grazing is a method of animal husbandry whereby domestic livestock are allowed outdoors to roam around and consume wild vegetations in order to convert the otherwise indigestible (by human gut) cellulose within grass and ot ...

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to ani ...

. The island has been degraded by repeated burning and grazing. Commercial

muttonbirding Muttonbirding is the seasonal harvesting of the chicks of petrels, especially shearwater species, for food, oil and feathers by recreational or commercial hunters. Such hunting of petrels and other seabirds has occurred in various locations since ...

took place until 1957, and recreational muttonbirding since then. The island is part of the Franklin Sound Islands Important Bird Area, identified as such by

BirdLife International BirdLife International is a global partnership of non-governmental organizations that strives to conserve birds and their habitats. BirdLife International's priorities include preventing extinction of bird species, identifying and safeguarding ...

because it holds over 1% of the world populations of six bird species.

Flora and fauna

The island's vegetation is dominated by

tussock grass Tussock grasses or bunch grasses are a group of grass species in the family Poaceae. They usually grow as singular plants in clumps, tufts, hummocks, or bunches, rather than forming a sod or lawn, in meadows, grasslands, and prairies. As perenni ...

communities. Recorded 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 envir ...

and

wader 245px, A flock of Dunlins and Red knots">Red_knot.html" ;"title="Dunlins and Red knot">Dunlins and Red knots Waders or shorebirds are birds of the order Charadriiformes commonly found wikt:wade#Etymology 1, wading along shorelines and mudflat ...

species are

little penguin The little penguin (''Eudyptula minor'') is a species of penguin from New Zealand. They are commonly known as little blue penguins or blue penguins owing to their slate-blue plumage and are also known by their Māori name . The Australian li ...

short-tailed shearwater The short-tailed shearwater or slender-billed shearwater (''Ardenna tenuirostris''; formerly ''Puffinus tenuirostris''), also called yolla or moonbird, and commonly known as the muttonbird in Australia, is the most abundant seabird species in A ...

(600,000 pairs) and

sooty oystercatcher The sooty oystercatcher (''Haematopus fuliginosus'') is a species of oystercatcher. It is a wading bird endemic to Australia and commonly found on its coastline. It prefers rocky coastlines, but will occasionally live in estuaries. All of its fea ...

Reptile Reptiles, as most commonly defined are the animals in the class Reptilia ( ), a paraphyletic grouping comprising all sauropsids except birds. Living reptiles comprise turtles, crocodilians, squamates ( lizards and snakes) and rhynchocephalia ...

s present include the

metallic skink :''"Metallic skink" may also refer to the garden skink ( Lampropholis delicata)''. ''Carinascincus metallicus'', the metallic cool-skink or metallic skink is a species of skink in the family Scincidae. It is endemic to Australia, found in sout ...

and tiger snake.Brothers, Nigel; Pemberton, David; Pryor, Helen; & Halley, Vanessa. (2001). ''Tasmania’s Offshore Islands: seabirds and other natural features''. Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery: Hobart.

References

Furneaux Group {{Tasmania-geo-stub

Flora and fauna

See also

References