The Plana Cays are a group of two small islands in the southern Bahama Islands located east of Acklins Island

Acklins

Acklins is an island and district of the Bahamas.It is one of a group of islands arranged along a large, shallow lagoon called the Bight of Acklins, of which the largest are Crooked Island in the north and Acklins in the southeast, and the smaller are Long Cay [ 8sq mi] in the northwest, and...

 and west of Mayaguana Island

Mayaguana

Mayaguana is the most easterly island and district of the Bahamas. It is one of only a few Bahamian islands which retain their Lucayan names. The population of Mayaguana in the 2000 census was 259, amounting to an estimate 312 in 2010...

. The islands are today uninhabited.

The eastern cay was the last natural habitat of the Bahamaian hutia

Bahamian Hutia

The Bahamian Hutia or Ingraham's Hutia is a species of rodent in the Capromyidae family.Geocapromys ingrahami is endemic to the Bahamas.-Habitat:...

, a species of rabbit

Rabbit

Rabbits are small mammals in the family Leporidae of the order Lagomorpha, found in several parts of the world...

-sized rodent

Rodent

Rodentia is an order of mammals also known as rodents, characterised by two continuously growing incisors in the upper and lower jaws which must be kept short by gnawing....

. It was thought to be extinct until 1966, when a population was found on the Plana Cays by Garrett Clough. Hutias have since been transplanted from the Plana Cays to other parts of the Bahamas.

The Plana Cays have been suggested as the first landfall of Christopher Columbus

Guanahani

Guanahani was the name the natives gave to the island that Christopher Columbus called San Salvador when he arrived at the Americas. Columbus reached the island on 12 October 1492, the first island he sighted and visited in the Americas...

in the New World.