Island Life/XI

CHAPTER XI

THE CLASSIFICATION OF ISLANDS


 * Importance of Islands in the Study of the Distribution of Organisms—Classification of Islands with Reference to Distribution—Continental Islands—Oceanic Islands.

In the preceding chapters, forming the first part of our work, we have discussed, more or less fully, the general features presented by animal distribution, as well as the various physical and biological changes which have been the most important agents in bringing about the present condition of the organic world.

We now proceed to apply these principles to the solution of the numerous problems presented by the distribution of animals; and in order to limit the field of our inquiry, and at the same time to deal only with such facts as may be rendered intelligible and interesting to those readers who have not much acquaintance with the details of natural history, we propose to consider only such phenomena as are presented by the islands of the globe.

Importance of Islands in the Study of the Distribution of Organisms.—Islands possess many advantages for the study of the laws and phenomena of distribution. As compared with continents they have a restricted area and definite boundaries, and in most cases their geographical and biological limits coincide. The number of species and of genera they contain is always much smaller than in the case of continents, and their peculiar species and groups are usually well defined and strictly limited in range. Again, their relations with other lands are often direct and simple, and even when more complex are far easier to comprehend than those of continents; and they exhibit besides certain influences on the forms of life and certain peculiarities in their distribution which continents do not present, and whose study offers many points of interest.

In islands we have the facts of distribution presented to us, sometimes in their simplest forms, in other cases becoming gradually more and more complex; and we are therefore able to proceed step by step in the solution of the problems they present. But as in studying these problems we have necessarily to take into account the relations of the insular and continental faunas, we also get some knowledge of the latter, and acquire besides so much command over the general principles which underlie all problems of distribution, that it is not too much to say that when we have mastered the difficulties presented by the peculiarities of island life we shall find it comparatively easy to deal with the more complex and less clearly defined problems of continental distribution.

Classification of Islands with Reference to Distribution.—Islands have had two distinct modes of origin—they have either been separated from continents of which they are but detached fragments, or they have originated in the ocean and have never formed part of a continent or any large mass of land. This difference of origin is fundamental, and leads to a most important difference in their animal inhabitants; and we may therefore first distinguish the two classes—oceanic and continental islands.

Mr. Darwin appears to have been the first writer who called attention to the number and importance, both from a geological and biological point of view, of oceanic islands. He showed that with very few exceptions all the remoter islands of the great oceans were of volcanic or coralline formation, and that none of them contained indigenous mammalia or amphibia. He also showed the connection of these two phenomena, and maintained that none of the islands so characterised had ever formed part of a continent. This was quite opposed to the opinions of the scientific men of the day, who almost all held the idea of continental extensions, and of oceanic islands being their fragments, and it was long before Mr. Darwin's views obtained general acceptance. Even now the belief still lingers; and we continually hear of old Atlantic or Pacific continents, of "Atlantis" or "Lemuria," of which hypothetical lands many existing islands, although wholly volcanic, are thought to be the remnants. We have already seen that Darwin connected the peculiar geological structure of oceanic islands with the permanence of the great oceans which contain them, and we have shown that several distinct lines of evidence all point to the same conclusion. We may therefore define oceanic islands, as follows:—Islands of volcanic or coralline formation, usually far from continents and always separated from them by very deep sea, entirely without indigenous land mammalia or amphibia, but with a fair number of birds and insects, and usually with some reptiles. This definition will exclude only two islands which have been sometimes classed as oceanic—New Zealand and the Seychelles. Rodriguez, which was once thought to be another exception, has been shown by the explorations during the Transit of Venus Expedition to be essentially volcanic, with some upraised coralline limestone.

Continental Islands.—Continental islands are always more varied in their geological formation, containing both ancient and recent stratified rocks. They are rarely very remote from a continent, and they always contain some land mammals and amphibia, as well as representatives of the other classes and orders in considerable variety. They may, however, be divided into two well-marked groups—ancient and recent continental islands—the characters of which may be easily defined.

Recent continental islands are always situated on submerged banks connecting them with a continent, and the depth of the intervening sea rarely exceeds 100 fathoms. They resemble the continent in their geological structure, while their animal and vegetable productions are either almost identical with those of the continent, or if otherwise, the difference consists in the presence of closely allied species of the same types, with occasionally a very few peculiar genera. They possess in fact all the characteristics of a portion of the continent, separated from it at a recent geological period.

Ancient continental islands differ greatly from the preceding in many respects. They are not united to the adjacent continent by a shallow bank, but are usually separated from it by a depth of sea of several hundreds to more than a thousand fathoms. In geological structure they agree generally with the more recent islands; like them they possess mammalia and amphibia, usually in considerable abundance, as well as all other classes of animals; but these are highly peculiar, almost all being distinct species, and many forming distinct and peculiar genera or families. They are also well characterised by the fragmentary nature of their fauna, many of the most characteristic continental orders or families being quite unrepresented, while some of their animals are allied, not to such forms as inhabit the adjacent continent, but to others found only in remote parts of the world. This very remarkable set of characters marks off the islands which exhibit them as a distinct class, which often present the greatest anomalies and most difficult problems to the student of distribution.

Oceanic Islands.—The total absence of warm-blooded terrestrial animals in an island otherwise well suited to maintain them, is held to prove that such island is no mere fragment of any existing or submerged continent, but one that has been actually produced in mid-ocean. It is true that if a continental island were to be completely submerged for a single day and then again elevated, its higher terrestrial animals would be all destroyed, and if it were situated at a considerable distance from land it would be reduced to the same zoological condition as an oceanic island. But such a complete submergence and re-elevation appears never to have taken place, for there is no single island on the globe which has the physical and geological features of a continental, combined with the zoological features of an oceanic island. It is true that some of the coral-islands may be formed upon submerged lands of a continental character, but we have no proof of this; and even if it were so, the existing islands are to all intents and purposes oceanic.

We will now pass on to a consideration of some of the more interesting examples of these three classes, beginning with oceanic islands.

All the animals which now inhabit such oceanic islands must either themselves have reached them by crossing the ocean, or be the descendants of ancestors who did so. Let us then see what are, in fact, the animal and vegetable inhabitants of these islands, and how far their presence can be accounted for. We will begin with the Azores, or Western Islands, because they have been thoroughly well explored by naturalists, and in their peculiarities afford us an important clue to some of the most efficient means of distribution among several classes of animals.