English Island (South Australia) facts for kids
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| Geography | |
|---|---|
| Archipelago | Sir Joseph Banks Group |
| Adjacent bodies of water | Spencer Gulf |
| Administration | |
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Australia
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English Island is an island off the coast of Eyre Peninsula in South Australia. It is a part of the Sir Joseph Banks Group and close to Sibsey Island. The island is most notable for its large colony of sea lions, and for a secession movement started by the eccentric and self-styled "Sir Ralph Styles of English Island" in 1954.
Flora and fauna
The island is part of the Sir Joseph Banks Group Important Bird Area, identified as such by BirdLife International because of its importance as a breeding site for seabirds and for Cape Barren geese. It first obtained protected area status as a fauna conservation reserve declared under the Crown Lands Act 1929-1966 on 16 March 1967.
In 1926, English Island was described as "teeming" with seals and thousands of breeding cormorants. Each nest contained one, two or three pale greenish eggs.
In 1935 the island was described as "flat, low, and literally smothered in shags... The birds stood in rank beyond rank on the rock— thousands of them... From the rocks, seals dived into the sea and came playing around the cutter, lifting dog-like heads to stare at us."
Australian sealions were observed on English Island in 1935 and 1937 and were photographed by a McCoy Society expedition there. In 1938, a visitor estimated there were roughly 300 present.
