| The Wildlife Conservation Society announced the ownership of two spectacular, uninhabited islands in the south Atlantic, home to huge numbers of penguins, albatrosses, and other rare wildlife. The islands, part of the Falklands archipelago, were donated by New York philanthropist Michael Steinhardt, who is a member of the WCS Board of Trustees.
Called Steeple Jason and Grand Jason, the islands lie about 250 miles east of Argentina on the edge of the continental shelf. They support not only large populations of penguins (rockhopper, gentoo, Magellanic) and black-browed albatrosses, but also Southern giant petrel, Falklands skua, and one of the world's rarest birds-of-prey, the "johnny rook" (a.k.a. striated caracara).
Steeple Jason Island is over five miles long and nearly a mile across at its widest point; Grand Jason Island is nearly seven miles long and approximately two miles across. They are among the westernmost islands in the Falklands chain. Steeple Jason's nesting population of more than 150,000 pairs of black-browed albatrosses is considered the largest in the world.
But the islands are more than just two isolated jewels. Long-term WCS research in neighboring Patagonia shows that the Jasons are part of a much larger, dynamic ecosystem, vital to everything from elephant seals to penguins.
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