Damer, or Damar, ( id, Pulau Damer) is a small

volcanic A volcano is a rupture in the crust of a planetary-mass object, such as Earth, that allows hot lava, volcanic ash, and gases to escape from a magma chamber below the surface. On Earth, volcanoes are most often found where tectonic plates a ...

island in the

Barat Daya Islands The Barat Daya Islands ( id, Kepulauan Barat Daya) are a group of islands in the Maluku province of Indonesia. The Indonesian phrase ''barat daya'' means 'south-west'. Geography These islands are located off the eastern end of East Timor. Wetar ...

group in

Indonesia Indonesia, officially the Republic of Indonesia, is a country in Southeast Asia and Oceania between the Indian and Pacific oceans. It consists of over 17,000 islands, including Sumatra, Java, Sulawesi, and parts of Borneo and New Guine ...

's Maluku province, on the southern side of the

Banda Sea The Banda Sea ( id, Laut Banda, pt, Mar de Banda, tet, Tasi Banda) is one of four seas that surround the Maluku Islands of Indonesia, connected to the Pacific Ocean, but surrounded by hundreds of islands, including Timor, as well as the Halma ...

. It is flanked by four smaller islands - one to the east, one to the west and two to the south. Together they are called the Damar Islands, and constitute one administrative district within the

Maluku Barat Daya Southwest Maluku Regency ( id, Kabupaten Maluku Barat Daya) is a regency of Maluku Province, Indonesia. It comprises a number of islands and island groups in the south of the province, including (running from west to east) Lirang Island, Wetar Is ...

Regency. The district has a land area of 392.29 km² and had a population of 5,718 at the 2020 Census.

Description

Damar is about 20 km (12 mi.) long by 18 km (11 mi.) wide. It lies about 125 km (78 mi.) east of Romang and 200 km (124 mi.) east of

Wetar Wetar is a tropical island which belongs to the Indonesian province of Maluku and is the largest island of the Maluku Barat Daya Islands (literally ''Southwest Islands'') of the Maluku Islands. It lies east of the Lesser Sunda Islands, which i ...

. The northern part of the island has been largely cleared for dryland farming of coconuts, cashews,

coffee bean A coffee bean is a seed of the '' Coffea'' plant and the source for coffee. It is the pip inside the red or purple fruit often referred to as a coffee cherry. Just like ordinary cherries, the coffee fruit is also a so-called stone fruit. Even th ...

cocoa bean The cocoa bean (technically cocoa seed) or simply cocoa (), also called the cacao bean (technically cacao seed) or cacao (), is the dried and fully fermented seed of ''Theobroma cacao'', from which cocoa solids (a mixture of nonfat substance ...

s, cloves and

nutmeg Nutmeg is the seed or ground spice of several species of the genus ''Myristica''. ''Myristica fragrans'' (fragrant nutmeg or true nutmeg) is a dark-leaved evergreen tree cultivated for two spices derived from its fruit: nutmeg, from its seed, an ...

s, while the southern part is still mainly forested. Habitation is concentrated in the north and east; most islanders are farmers or fishers. The highest point of the island is 868 m (2,847 ft) Mount Wurlali, an

andesitic Andesite () is a volcanic rock of intermediate composition. In a general sense, it is the intermediate type between silica-poor basalt and silica-rich rhyolite. It is fine-grained (aphanitic) to porphyritic in texture, and is composed predomin ...

stratovolcano.

Important Bird Area

The forested part of the island has been identified by BirdLife International as an Important Bird Area because it supports the

endemic Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...

Damar flycatcher, which is largely restricted to lowland

evergreen In botany, an evergreen is a plant which has foliage that remains green and functional through more than one growing season. This also pertains to plants that retain their foliage only in warm climates, and contrasts with deciduous plants, whic ...

forest habitat.

References

Barat Daya Islands Important Bird Areas of Indonesia Islands of the Maluku Islands {{Maluku-geo-stub