Beata Island ( es, Isla Beata) is a small

island An island or isle is a piece of subcontinental land completely surrounded by water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An island in a river or a lake island may be ...

on the

Caribbean Sea The Caribbean Sea ( es, Mar Caribe; french: Mer des Caraïbes; ht, Lanmè Karayib; jam, Kiaribiyan Sii; nl, Caraïbische Zee; pap, Laman Karibe) is a sea of the Atlantic Ocean in the tropics of the Western Hemisphere. It is bounded by Mexico ...

, located southwest from

Cape Beata Cabo Beata is the southernmost point of the island of Hispaniola, in the Pedernales Province of the Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greate ...

. Some southwest of it lies the smaller Alto Velo Island. It is politically part of the

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic ( ; es, República Dominicana, ) is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles archipelago of the Caribbean region. It occupies the eastern five-eighths of the island, which it shares with ...

, and is roughly triangle-shaped and fairly flat, with an approximate area of .

History

Beata Island was discovered by Europeans during the second voyage of Christopher Columbus in 1494. Originally populated by Taíno natives, the island became a colonial asset of the

Captaincy General of Santo Domingo The Captaincy General of Santo Domingo ( es, Capitanía General de Santo Domingo ) was the first colony in the New World, established by Spain in 1492 on the island of Hispaniola. The colony, under the jurisdiction of the Real Audiencia of Santo ...

and the greater

Spanish Empire The Spanish Empire ( es, link=no, Imperio español), also known as the Hispanic Monarchy ( es, link=no, Monarquía Hispánica) or the Catholic Monarchy ( es, link=no, Monarquía Católica) was a colonial empire governed by Spain and its prede ...

. The island was the site of various military engagements between the Spanish and roving pirates.

Geography

The landscape is somewhat varied, with

mangrove A mangrove is a shrub or tree that grows in coastal saline or brackish water. The term is also used for tropical coastal vegetation consisting of such species. Mangroves are taxonomically diverse, as a result of convergent evolution in several ...

swamps on parts of the North shore, sandy coves and beaches on the west coast. Most of the interior of the island is covered by various subtypes of

xeric Deserts and xeric shrublands are a biome defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature. Deserts and xeric (ancient Greek xērós, “dry") shrublands form the largest terrestrial biome, covering 19% of Earth's land surface area. Ecoregions in this h ...

semi-

deciduous In the fields of horticulture and Botany, the term ''deciduous'' () means "falling off at maturity" and "tending to fall off", in reference to trees and shrubs that seasonally shed leaves, usually in the autumn; to the shedding of petals, a ...

limestone forests. Geologically, the island is basically made out of limestone, the erosion of which causes very jagged surfaces on exposed rocks (called ''diente de perro'' or dogtooth), and several

sinkholes A sinkhole is a depression or hole in the ground caused by some form of collapse of the surface layer. The term is sometimes used to refer to doline, enclosed depressions that are locally also known as ''vrtače'' and shakeholes, and to openi ...

and

cenote A cenote ( or ; ) is a natural pit, or sinkhole, resulting from the collapse of limestone bedrock that exposes groundwater. The regional term is specifically associated with the Yucatán Peninsula of Mexico, where cenotes were commonly used for ...

s. It has a large population of rhinoceros iguanas. Beata Island is currently unhabitated, save for short stays by fishermen from the mainland and a permanent Dominican military base with rotating personnel .

References

{{Reflist
nautilusproject.com

Uninhabited islands of the Dominican Republic Geography of Pedernales Province

History

Geography

See also

References