Little Tobago is a small island off the northeastern coast of Tobago

Tobago

Tobago is the smaller of the two main islands that make up the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago. It is located in the southern Caribbean, northeast of the island of Trinidad and southeast of Grenada. The island lies outside the hurricane belt...

, and part of the republic of Trinidad and Tobago

Trinidad and Tobago

Trinidad and Tobago officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago is an archipelagic state in the southern Caribbean, lying just off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and south of Grenada in the Lesser Antilles...

. The island is about 1 square kilometre in area and is located at 11° 18' north latitude

Latitude

In geography, the latitude of a location on the Earth is the angular distance of that location south or north of the Equator. The latitude is an angle, and is usually measured in degrees . The equator has a latitude of 0°, the North pole has a latitude of 90° north , and the South pole has a...

 and 60° 31' west longitude

Longitude

Longitude is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east-west position of a point on the Earth's surface. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees, minutes and seconds, and denoted by the Greek letter lambda ....

, approximately 2.4 km from Speyside

Speyside, Trinidad and Tobago

Speyside is a town in northern Tobago within Saint John Parish. It lies on the leeward coast, across from the island of Little Tobago , 26 km northeast of Scarborough, overlooking Tyrrel's Bay...

. The highest point on the island is approximately 137 m above sea level

Sea level

Mean sea level is a measure of the average height of the ocean's surface ; used as a standard in reckoning land elevation...

.

The island supports dry forest

Trinidad and Tobago dry forests

Trinidad and Tobago dry forests are tropical dry forests located primarily in western and southern parts of the island of Trinidad, in southern parts of the island of Tobago and on smaller offshore islands including Chacachacare, Monos, Huevos, Gaspar Grande, Little Tobago and Saint Giles...

. It is an important breeding site for seabird

Seabird

Seabirds are birds that have adapted to life within the marine environment. While seabirds vary greatly in lifestyle, behaviour and physiology, they often exhibit striking convergent evolution, as the same environmental problems and feeding niches have resulted in similar adaptations...

s such as Red-billed Tropicbird

Red-billed Tropicbird

The Red-billed Tropicbird, Phaethon aethereus, also known as the Boatswain Bird is a tropicbird, one of three closely related seabirds of tropical oceans.-Distribution and habitat:...

, Audubon's Shearwater

Audubon's Shearwater

Audubon's Shearwater, Puffinus lherminieri, is a common tropical seabird from the family Procellariidae. Sometimes called Dusky-backed Shearwater, the scientific name of this species commemorates the French naturalist Félix Louis L'Herminier....

, Brown Booby

Brown Booby

The Brown Booby is a large seabird of the booby family, Sulidae. The adult brown booby reaches about in length. Its head and upper body are covered in dark brown, with the remainder being a contrasting white. The juvenile form is gray-brown with darkening on the head, wings and tail...

, Brown Noddy

Brown Noddy

The Brown Noddy or Common Noddy is a seabird from the tern family. The largest of the noddies, it can be told from the closely related Black Noddy by its larger size and plumage, which is dark brown rather than black...

, Sooty

Sooty Tern

The Sooty Tern, Onychoprion fuscatus , is a seabird of the tern family . It is a bird of the tropical oceans, breeding on islands throughout the equatorial zone. Colloquially, it is known as the Wideawake Tern or just wideawake...

 and Bridled Tern

Bridled Tern

The Bridled Tern is a seabird of the tern family Sternidae. It is a bird of the tropical oceans.-Description:...

s. A few pairs of White-tailed Tropicbird

White-tailed Tropicbird

The White-tailed Tropicbird Phaethon lepturus, is a tropicbird, smallest of three closely related seabirds of the tropical oceans and smallest member of the order Phaethontiformes. It occurs in the tropical Atlantic, western Pacific and Indian Oceans...

s have also recently started nesting here.

Little Tobago is also a good site from which to see birds which breed on neighbouring small islands, including Red-footed Booby

Red-footed Booby

The Red-footed Booby, Sula sula, is a large seabird of the booby family, Sulidae. As suggested by the name, adults always have red feet, but the colour of the plumage varies. They are powerful and agile fliers, but they are clumsy in takeoffs and landings...

 and Magnificent Frigatebird

Magnificent Frigatebird

The Magnificent Frigatebird was sometimes previously known as Man O'War, reflecting its rakish lines, speed, and aerial piracy of other birds....

. The latter species is frequently seen harassing the tropicbirds, boobies and terns.

The sea between Tobago and Little Tobago is shallow, and glass-bottomed boats such as that shown below enable the attractive corals and brightly-coloured tropical fish to be seen on the crossing. It is a popular area for snorkeling and diving, especially on Angel Reef in front of Goat Island.

History

In 1909 Sir William Ingram

Sir William Ingram, 1st Baronet

Sir William James Ingram, 1st Baronet was Managing Director of The Illustrated London News and a Liberal politician who sat in the House of Commons in three periods between 1878 and 1895....

 introduced the Greater Bird of Paradise

Greater Bird of Paradise

The Greater Bird-of-paradise is a Bird-of-paradise in the genus ParadisaeaCarolus Linnaeus named the species Paradisaea apoda, or "legless bird-of-paradise", because early trade-skins to reach Europe were prepared without feet by natives; this led to the misconception that these birds were...

, Paradisaea apoda to the island in an attempt to save the species from overhunting for the plume trade in its native New Guinea

New Guinea

New Guinea is the world's second largest island, after Greenland, covering a land area of 786,000 km2. Located in the southwest Pacific Ocean, it lies geographically to the east of the Malay Archipelago, with which it is sometimes included as part of a greater Indo-Australian Archipelago...

. About 45 juvenile birds were introduced to the island. After Ingram's death in 1924 his heirs deeded the island to the Government of Trinidad and Tobago as a wildlife sanctuary. The birds survived on the island until at least 1958 when they were filmed by a National Geographic crew. There are no reliable records after 1963 when Hurricane Flora

Hurricane Flora

Hurricane Flora is among the deadliest Atlantic hurricanes in recorded history, with a death total of over 7,000. The seventh tropical storm and sixth hurricane of the 1963 Atlantic hurricane season, Flora developed from a disturbance in the Intertropical Convergence Zone on September 26 while...

hit the island and the population is presumed to be extinct.