Thoughts - An Uninhabited Island and What You'll Need To Inhabit it "Robinson Crusoe" Style

A few days ago I received an email from a reader wanting to know the location of an uninhabited island far removed from the "cares of man". Actually, the person desires a habitable island that is currently uninhabited. In addition, it should be so far off the beaten track, no one visits it, ever!

I haven't answered the email directly, but I will answer it in this post.

Some Challenges of Living on an Uninhabited Island

You must have water! Three to five days without it and you are gone. On islands with vegetation, water does exist, most often in a fresh-water lens, a fragile structure that traps fresh water amidst sea water and rock. Since water is the most critical element for human survival, one must locate and tap into this water source and hope that it is stable (no mixing with sea water) and of sufficient size and quality to supply potable water at a rate necessary to sustain human, animal and flora life. Another source of water is rainfall. Of course one would develop their own rainwater catchment basin to collect nature's falling waters. To be completely safe, a portable saltwater to freshwater conversion device would be handy.

Once you have water, you need shelter and loads of shelter making tools. A shelter should allow one to escape the elements, when necessary. It should provide a secure resting place away from the creeping, crawling, buzzing and walking critters. It should keep you dry during rain and be a comfortable place to read a good book.

Food is next up. Your diet will be opportunistic - non-poisonous fish, coconuts, taro (if possible), breadfruit and any other edible plant or animal found on your paradise isle.

Learn how to make you own clothing. It is less about modesty and more about protection from the elements. If you really dig the "leather skin" look, minimal clothing will suffice. If you are an anti-skin cancer person, clothing and an umbrella are a necessity.

Let's see, we have water, shelter, food and fashion taken care of. How about medical attention? If you are off the beaten track, you become your own doctor and your own medical supply source. Try to account for every medical eventuality that might occur on your coral surrounded island home (and know that you won't) and supply appropriately. Be careful! If you are alone, a small "boo boo" can turn into a major medical problem fast. Know how to treat those common medical problems so that you can live a quality existence on your tropical isle.

Taongi Atoll - EVS Precision Map (1:110,000)

Let's discuss the merits of two types of uninhabited islands. The first and perhaps most romantic is the coral atoll. Taongi Atoll is uninhabited today. It is a possession of the Republic of Marshall Islands. It is located in the Radak Chain at their northern extreme. It is off the beaten path. The land area is of sufficient size to allow many, let alone one, to live in reasonable comfort. The weather is Pacific-balmy many months out of the year. When rain falls, it is enough to feed it's freshwater lens and should be of sufficient quantity to capture in your rainwater catchment basin. Taongi is covered with vegetation, which consists of native and non-native flora. One of your most important flora being coconut palms for food and shelter. It is a low island, not more than 5 to 10 meters above sea level. A good storm surge would swamp the island. A catagory-4 typhoon would do loads of damage. However, the vegetation and it's appearance suggests that this island is frequently spared the ravages of typhoons. However, it is visited occasionally by RMI islanders to gather copra. Perhaps when they arrive, you could hide.

Eiao Island - EEVS Precision Map (1:65,000)

Or you could head to Eiao Island. It is located at the northern end of the Marquesas. It is 8 x 3-miles and has an elevation of 500-meters plus. Is was inhabited, but is no longer. The island is overrun with feral animals (rats, goats, sheep, pigs, cattle and a few horses) and they eat the vegetation to the point of extinction. The island has a freshwater spring. The amount of standing vegetation suggest ample rainfall. This island is subject to droughts, so a freshwater catchment basin is a necessity. The same fundamental living challenges apply to a high island as they would to living on an atoll with one exception, the occasional typhoon will blow your house down and level trees, but you should survive as no storm surge will reach this island's heights.

Would I Want to be the Only Inhabitant on My Own Island?

When I was younger, yes, most definitely. I absolutely knew I could not only survive, but I would thrive. Now that I'm a mite bit older, I would still like to go, but with a large amount of the comforts of civilization along with a carefully selected group of friends and family. I won't share my list of "must-haves", but know that my shelter would rival that of the Swiss Family Robinson, the Disneyland version.

Enjoy!

Mejit Island RMI - Los Lonely Island

Mejit Island

Mejit Island - Landsat Image N-59-10_2000 (1:31,250)

Mejit Island - EVS Precision Map (1:31,250)

The Marshall's are home to numerous atolls, many with a classic shape consisting of a deep central lagoon surrounded by shallow reefs and an occasional sliver of land with vegetation. That is except for islands like Mejit. It is a chunk of land between 5 to 10 meters high covered with lush vegetation and completely surrounded by a shallow reef. The shallow fringing reef makes landing difficult. There are 497 people living on Mejit. The islanders have an excellent school, medical facility and fishing is great. They also have a freshwater lake on their island that is supposed to be wonderful to swim in. Also, it seems that many of the coral atolls harbor poisonious fish, but the fish of Mejit are safe to eat.

How would you like to live and die on this small island? It is approximately 1 sq mile in area. To live your entire life within 1 sq mile seems confining. I am confident Mejit has had residents that have lived on this piece of coral from birth to death. Were they frustrated by their island's size limitation? Or were they so caught up in their daily lives that the size of their island never really entered their minds? Who knows!

If it appears the map was simple and fast to construct, you are right. It is a simple map, but the vectors are EVS precise and that makes for a good map.

Enjoy!

Vatican City - A Sovereign State and an Urban Island

Vatican City - DigitalGlobe Image Mosaic from Google Earth (1-580000)

My evening began innocently enough. A friend wanted to know something about an island in the Northern Mariana Islands. My first search involved Google Earth. After a few hours devoted to looking at islands scattered about the Pacific Ocean , I began to wander, you know "Google Earth wandering". Before long I was following the southern coast of France and Italy. And before I knew it, I was looking at Vatican City. Follow the preceding link and you can read an article about Vatican City. What I want to discuss is inspiration and hi-res imagery in Google Earth.

As I viewed Vatican City it appeared as a small island (44 hectares). The borders used in GE poorly track the city boundaries. I knew I could do better. First I needed to construct a DigitalGlobe image mosaic from which I could digitize a new border, a more accurate one. I could have drawn the polyline in GE, but what fun is that when you can spend a few hours constructing your very own image mosaic. I took a total of 30 screen shots at a scale of 1:250 from GE. Using ImageForge software I created a canvas 6000 x 4000 pixels to accommodate my finished mosaic. Using Irfanview software from which to select portions of images, I worked through 30 cut and pastes, ending up with the above image. My final image is 12.5 MBs and is 4980 x 3560 pixels in size. After georectifying, I zoomed about Vatican City to my heart's content. Maybe I'll try my own map of Vatican City later and maybe not.

It is just fun to construct one of these DigitalGlobe image mosaics using their hi-res imagery found in Google Earth. Take care and...

Enjoy!

Utirik & Taka Atolls RMI - One With and One Without, People That Is.

Utirik & Taka Atolls

Utirik & Taka Atolls - EVS Precision Map (1:170,000)

Utirik Atoll - Landsat N-59-10-_2000 Image (1:100,000)

Utirik Atoll - EVS Precision Map (1:100,000)

Utirik Atoll is the northernmost RMI atoll with a permanent population. 490 people harvest copra, catch fish and work at any other means to put food on the table and maintain a quality of life suitable for them and their families.

Taka Atoll - Landsat N-59-10_2000 Image (1:100,000)

Taka Atoll - EVS Precision Map (1:100,000)

About 6-miles away is the uninhabited Taka (or Toke) Atoll. People from Utirik Atoll periodically visit Taka Atoll to harvest copra and catch fish.

The maps took 6-hours to complete. If you study the maps closely you will notice two additional reef layers of information. I added Reef Awash for very shallow reef and Reef Break for the area of reef marked by breaking waves. All other layers, Island Polygon, Vegetation, Reef Shallow and Reef Deep are included as well. This was a satisfying map making effort.

Enjoy!

Eiao Island FP - Still Revising My Maps

Eiao Island - Google Earth Image (1-60,000) as of March 2007

Eiao Island - Digital Globe Mosaic (1-60,000)

Google Earth and all of us end users have sure benefited from their relationship with DigitalGlobe. From the first blurry image in GE to the exquisite DG mosaic, Eiao Island has never looked better.

Eiao - Map (1:60,000) as of May 2006

Eiao Island - EEVS Precision Map (1-65,000)

My first map of Eiao Island constructed from WVS vector files. In May 2006, I had yet to discover the full extent of resources available to all of us neo-cartographers. I routinely use Global Mapper as my mapping platform. My imagery comes from my Landsat ETM+ library of all the world's shorelines or from DigitalGlobe imagery found in Google Earth. My final island map products are getting better and better. And that's good.

Enjoy!

Thoughts - The Rat, The Mouse, The Cat and The Rabbit Who Ate The Bird or Should Macquarie Island Be Saved?

Cats Love Birds

Cats Love Rabbits Too

It seems that some silly eco-dudes messed up again (see BBC article). Macquarie Island, a World Heritage Site containing a fragile eco-system, is a possession of Australia and is located in the Southern seas. Before people came on the scene, life was simple for the birds and plants that populated this island. The birds would fly into and out on their annual migrations. Some of the birds decided to stay. Since they occupied the top of the food chain on the island, they decided that walking was better than flying. So they walked and forgot how to fly. Life was swell for all of the birds. And to help the island, they ate the seeds from plants and walked about pooping them so that new plants would grow where the seed landed. Life was swell, then we arrived.

Most probably the first human visitor was a transient, perhaps a wandering Maori. This hardy soul realized that life for humans would be harsh on this island. After a brief stay, he left and sailed home. Later, whalers and seal hunters came to establish a base from which they could land and rest before they ventured out to capture and process more whales and seals. They brought the first uninvited feral residents, the rat and mouse. Rats and mice know how to make babies. Before long rats and mice were everywhere. They didn't mind the harsh climate. They had plenty of food from plants and delicious treats found in bird's nests, like eggs or baby birds. They loved the place.

Someone got the bright idea to introduce cats to control the rats and the mice. Well, the cats ate the rats and the mice and unfortunately the birds too. Cats also know how to make lots of baby cats. Before long, Macquarie Island had too many cats, rats, mice and fewer birds.

Back in 1878 one of the seal hunters got homesick for rabbit stew so he brought a cage full of rabbits. He ate a few and some of the lucky survivors escaped into the wilds of Macquarie Island. Rabbits really know how to make baby rabbits. It wasn't long before Macquarie Island had too many cats, rats, mice, rabbits and fewer and fewer birds. Also, those rabbits loved to eat the plants. Not some of the plants, but everything that grows. What a mess!

How should we fix this mess? Someone, during the 1960's, suggested to the Australian government that they knew how to get rid of the uninvited guests, those feral critters - cats, rats, mice and rabbits. They proposed a "killer" idea - infect the rabbits with myxomatosis, a rabbit killing disease. It worked! The rabbit population plunged to 10,000. So the cats, hungry for rabbits, supplemented their diet with more birds.

In 2000 a program to eradicate the cats was implemented and it worked. All of the cats were removed leaving behind rabbits, rats, mice and fewer birds. Without the cats, the myxomatosis resistant rabbits thrived. In eight years their population increased tenfold and they were hungry.

This year the rest of the uninvited guests, rabbits, rats and mice, will be eradicated. They will be systematically poisoned. It is hoped that only the rabbits, rats and mice will eat the poison and the birds will not. Also, this phase of the eradication program will cost $24 million AUS. Big bucks in this difficult economic time.

If you do a Google search for "Macquarie Island Rabbits", you will locate many news articles describing the fate of Macquarie Island and it's uninvited feral guests. Most articles suggest that the cat removal was an enormous mistake causing "catastrophic damages". The real mistake will be to not complete the job. If this island is considered to be a world treasure, then restoration to it's pristine state is a necessity, a costly one, but a necessity. If, on the other hand, we really don't think Macquarie Island is worth this costly restoration effort, we should standby and watch this island be "catastrophically damaged" by rabbits, rats and mice.

Enjoy and SAVE MACQUARIE ISLAND!

Bikar Atoll FM - Another Uninhabited Tropical Isle

Bikar Atoll RM (ARB-127)

Bikar Atoll (H.0. 6024) ARB-127

This is the second atoll within the Radak Group that I have mapped in EVS precision. The first atoll was Taongi and now Bikar. Using the maps contained in ARB-127 as inspiration, I have decided to busy myself with maps in this group of atolls. Bikar, like Taongi, is small with only 0.9 sq km of land area. The atoll does contain vegetation, a small forest dominated by pisionia grandis trees. Other than that, the vegetation is scrub size and lower. The atoll is a great nesting place for seabirds.

Bikar Atoll - Landsat Image from N-59-10_2000 (1-75,000)

Bikar Atoll - EVS Precision Map (1-75,000)

The Landsat image used as my base is cloud free and excellent in detail. I did my digitizing at 1:12500 scale, one not practical for viewing, but good for map making. The map took about 2-hours to complete.

Enjoy!

Thoughts - I Wonder If They Have Layoffs at North Sentinel Island?

North Sentinel Island - EVS Map (1:62,500)

During this difficult economic time throughtout the industrialized world, I am curious if more remote regions are escaping the more dire consequences - the layoff from your job. Friends and family are undergoing this economic rite - to be told you are no longer needed in your economic contributions. Those contributions generate an income that you and your family require, but your employer does not. What a mess!

Do you think the Sentinelese of North Sentinel Island have layoffs? I suspect that as long as they are able to contribute to the good of the group, typically 30 to 50 individuals, they remain as members. They are allowed to gather food and game to sustain the life of the group. No need for flat screen TVs, no electricity. Homes are simple shelters that provide protection for a family. They might banish a law breaker for acts harmful to the group and justifiably. But because times are difficult they would not abandon a member of their group. No they would find ways to solve their problem by productively employing all members of their group, not by selectively removing members.

Where did we go wrong? Why does civilization, industrialized civilization, marginalize members through their removal from economic contributions?

I am just rambling. Sorry for the rant, but it has been a rough week for my family and there are times that the life of a Sentinelese looks very attractive.

Take care, friends.

Taongi Atoll - Uninhabited, H-Bombs and My EVS Precision Map

ARB-127 Ornithology of the Marshall and Gilbert Islands

Taongi Atoll (H.O. 6024) ARB-127

Marshall and Gilbert Islands ARB-127

I enjoy reading the Smithsonian Atoll Research Bulletin available at the above link as PDF documents. First encountering them at Scripps Institute of Oceanography's library, I most especially enjoyed the detailed discussion of specific atolls. The articles are scholarly in content, yet accessible to the interested public.

A few years ago I took a class on how to work with enamel. It was instant gratification. Coat the copper plate with different colors of enamel, cook for about 1-minute at 1500°, let cool for 5-minutes and you have your finished work of art. You'll never guess what I made, my very first project was a map of an atoll, Taongi Atoll. I used the ARB-127 map based on chart H.O. 6024. It turned out nice. Why Taongi, why not!

Last week I was browsing my collection of ARB's and was looking at the collection of maps of all of the Marshall and Gilbert Islands which make up a significant portion of ARB-127. I studied the Taongi Atoll map and decided that I would make an EVS precision map of the island. Using Landsat N-59-10_2000 as my base image I constructed my map in about 4-hours. The bulk of the time was spent digitizing the coral heads scattered throughout the lagoon. But more on that later.

Operation Hardtack - Proposal to include Taongi Atoll as H-bomb test site

While researching the atoll, I came across a once classified document proposing that Taongi Atoll be used as a site to explode atomic bombs. This atoll would have been the third atoll besides Bikini and Enewetak, to be catastrophically damaged by slowly desolving nuclear radiation. Cooler heads prevailed and Taongi Atoll was spared. The ordinances intended for Taongi Atoll were exploded at the Nevada test site.

Taongi Atoll - Landsat Image from N-59-10_2000 Standard Landsat ETM+ Colors (1:110,000)

Taongi Atoll - Landsat Image from N-59-10_2000 Modified Colors for Reef Digitizing (1:110,000)

Now for my map. I was convinced I could create a map that would be far superior to the H.O. 6034 version in ARB-127. Looking at the standard Landsat image, I could see that the mapping would be uncomplicated. Curious soul that I am, I decided to play around with colors. After a number of color tweaks, I discovered the puke green image. The shallow reef was a lighter puke green and the deep reef a different shade of green. As a bonus this color tweak turned the island vegetation into a reddish pink. In addition, this color scheme allowed for a greater number of coral head to be digitized.

Taongi Atoll - EVS Precision Map (1:110,000)

And here is my finished map. The scale is 1:110,000 (1 cm = 1.1 km). My finished EVS precision map of Taongi Atoll contain my normal vector layers; island polygon, vegetation, shallow reef and deep reef. I tried something different when labeling. I used a feature in Global Mapper to assign text to a specific point and in this way I assigned lat/lons. The island names and other text were also assigned using Global Mapper. I used MS Draw to construct the lat/lon lines. I think this is a good mapping effort.

Today, the atoll is a nature preserve and remains uninhabited. Thanks to some unknown beaurecrat, the island remains nuclear radiation free!

Enjoy!