58 Australian Heritage

AROUND SEVEN millionyears ago, Lord HoweIsland was born in aclash of fire and water.

A stationary ‘hot spot’, deep belowthe ocean had for the previous 15million years forced molten lavathrough the earth’s mantle, creating

a 1000 km long chain of submarinemountains. At the southern end ofthis chain, a volcano burst from thedepths to create an island 30 kmacross and a kilometre high.

After the volcanic activitysubsided around 6.3 million yearsago, the forces of wind and rain

went to work, carving and whittlingthe island away until now it is justone-fortieth of its original area andhalf its original height.

The waters that surround theisland are a blending of warm andcool currents just warm enough forstony corals to grow. A barrier reef,

Lord Howe

Island of ProvidenceMore than five hundred kilometres from Australia’s east coast, Lord Howe Island was, until 1788, an isolatedsanctuary for a diversity of plant and animal life, undisturbed by human activity. Today it is World Heritagelisted for the wealth of its unique species, for its unusual geological origins and for its extraordinary beauty.

BY ROSALIND STIRLING AND MARK KELLETT

the most southerly on earth,gradually formed to create aprotected lagoon that supports amixture of tropical and temperatemarine life, some of which is foundnowhere else.

It was the remains of coral andother marine life, pounded to sandand washed ashore, that formedthe sedimentary rock calledcalcarenite that now makes up the island’s lowlands.

With a mild climate, plentifulrainfall and rich volcanic soils andlimestone sands, Lord Howe Islandprovided a fertile habitat for manyplant and animal emigrants.

Plants arrived as seeds, blown by the wind, floating on the sea or carried by birds. Oncegerminated, these pioneers were cut off from others of their speciesand, over many generations, theyevolved in response to the island’sunique conditions.

Some plants, such as the ancestorsof the island’s palms, evolved somuch that they formed new generafound nowhere else in the world,with distinct species specialised fordifferent parts of the island. Theiconic kentia palm (Howeaforsteriana) grows best in the sandysoils of the lowlands, while theclosely related curly palm (Howea

belmoreana) favours the volcanicsoils of the lower slopes. Many ofthe island’s plants evolved in thisway, and nearly half of them arefound only on Lord Howe Islandand its surrounding islets.

Once plants had taken root,animals could join them. Flyinginsects and spiders (whose young areable to ‘parachute’ over hugedistances on threads of silk) reachedthe island with the wind. Snails andearthworms probably arrived ondrifting rafts of debris. Again,evolution worked to create newspecies, and about two-thirds ofLord Howe Island’s invertebrates,including the giant Lord Howephasmid (Dryococelus australis) (seepage 64) are found nowhere else.

The growing diversity of plantsand insects on the island providedfood for emigrant vertebrates. Theancestors of the Lord Howe gecko(Christinus guentheri) and the LordHowe skink (Leilopisma lichenigera)were also probably brought to theisland on floating debris. Twospecies of bats flew from Australia.The large forest bat (Vespadelusdarlingtoni) is also found on themainland, but the Lord Howe long-eared bat (Nyctophilus howensis) hasevolved to the point where it hasbecome a distinct species.

The most effective colonists ofLord Howe Island were undoubtedlybirds. Most of the land birds evolvedonly slightly, and are recognisable asvarieties of species from nearbylands. Amongst these were the LordHowe red-fronted parakeet(Cyanoramphus novaezelandiaesubflavescens) which was larger thanits relatives on Norfolk Island; theLord Howe boobook owl (Ninoxnovaeseelandiae albaria), smaller thanthe Australian one; and the white-throated pigeon (Columba vitiensisgodmanae), whose plumage wasslightly different from that of thewidespread metallic pigeon. Somebirds, however, like the now extinctflightless white gallinule (Porphyrio

Australian Heritage 59

LEFT: View across Lord Howe Island to

Mount Lidgbird and Mount Gower. Photo

Hallmark Editions.

60 Australian Heritage

albus) and the woodhen (Gallirallussylvestris) (see page 64), evolved tosuch an extent that they wereimmediately recognisable as distinct species.

Sea birds also came to the islandto breed. Fourteen species includingprovidence petrels (Pterodromasolandri), flesh-footed shearwaters(Puffinus carneipes), sooty terns(Sterna fuscata), and red-tailedtropicbirds (Phaethon rubricauda),congregate here in their thousandseach year.

It was huge flocks of seabirds thatheralded the end of this pristineisland’s isolation from humanity. On17 January 1788, the Frenchnavigator Jean François de GaloupLa Pérouse noted in his log “…wewere surrounded by an innumerablequantity of seagulls, leading us tobelieve that we were sailing near to

some kind of island or rock…” It ispossible that La Pérouse was the firstperson to make this observation.The seafaring Polynesians had foundand colonised nearly all Pacificislands, but Lord Howe Island wasnot among them.

Though La Pérouse never foundthe island, he may have contributedto its discovery by sharing hisfindings with the British at PortJackson. On 17 February 1788, thearmed tender, Supply, sighted theisland’s dramatic mountain peakswhile transporting soldiers andconvicts to Norfolk Island. Hercommander, Lieutenant HenryLidgbird Ball, named it Lord Howe’sIsland in honour of the First Lord ofthe Admiralty, Earl Richard Howe.

On the return trip, the Supplystopped at the island on 13 Marchand, finding it uninhabited,

Lieutenant Ball took possession inthe name of King George III andnamed some of the features forhimself and his naval colleagues.Without a natural anchorage or anyuseful stands of timber, Ball did notrecommend the island as a potentialcolony but the 15 turtles that hebrought back with him and reportsof abundant birds, fish and fruitwere welcome news to the PortJackson settlers who were alreadystruggling to feed themselves.

In May 1788, the Supply set outon a return trip to Lord Howe Islandto stock up on turtles. In spite ofGovernor Philip’s efforts to keepthis lifeline for his colony secretfrom the departing First Fleet, thefirst three ships to leave, Charlotte,Lady Penhryn and Scarborough,stopped off at the island on theirway to China. To thedisappointment of their crews, theturtles had vanished on theirmigration to warmer waters. Birds,however, were still plentiful andeasily caught, as Captain ThomasGilbert of the Charlotte observed:

Great numbers of gannets, verylarge and fat, were walking withless fear and concern than geesein a farmyard; and they weretaken by hand, with much moreease. We found their nests inthe long grass at the head of the

Kentia palm forest at the base of Mount Gower. Photo Hallmark Editions.

Golden orb weaver, one of 180 species of

spider on Lord Howe Island. Photo Hallmark

Editions.

Australian Heritage 61

beach, in each of which there were a great numberof eggs, very large and well tasted when dressed. Onentering the woods I was surprised to see large fatpigeons, of the same plumage and make as those inEurope, sitting on low bushes, and so insensible tofear, as to be knocked down with little trouble.Over the next two decades Lord Howe Island was

visited by ships of the Royal Navy to collect turtles forthe Port Jackson and Norfolk Island colonies, mostlikely to grace the tables of the officers and for use inthe hospital.

In 1798, the American whaling ship Ann and Hopearrived, the first of many American, Australian andEuropean whalers to visit Lord Howe Island over thenext 70 years. They came not only for food and water,but for ‘whaler’s wood’, “a stunted tree found growingnear the water, which burns with a fierce heat” that wasused for rendering blubber into whale oil.

In 1834, three Englishmen from New Zealand wereemployed by the Sydney-based company, RobertCampbell & Co, to establish a permanent supplystation for the whaling industry. Bringing their Maoriwives and children, they built huts, caught fish, keptpoultry, planted vegetable gardens and captured andfarmed the pigs and goats that had been left to run wildby whalers. They traded their produce with visitingwhalers for clothing, tools, soap, sugar salt, tea, tobaccoand rum.

Seven years later, Captain Owen Poole, a retiredBritish officer and a partner with Sydney ironmongers,Richard Dawson & Henry Augustus Castle, bought thetrading station from Robert Campbell & Co, and LordHowe Island’s boom period as a provisioning station

began. The discovery of gold in Australia in 1851increased whaling traffic at Lord Howe Island stillfurther, as nervous ships’ masters called there ratherthan at the mainland where crew were likely to desertfor the goldfields. However, by the early 1860s thewhaling trade declined as a result of overhunting ofwhales and the destruction of most of the Union Pacificwhaling fleet by Confederate raiders during theAmerican civil war.

By this time, Lord Howe Island’s fragile ecology hadbeen seriously affected by the predations of humans andtheir feral pigs and goats. Goats ate the forestunderstorey and the coming generations of canopy

Sooty terns breed in large numbers on Lord Howe and its offshore islands. Photo Hallmark Editions.

Emerald ground dove, widespread in Australia and possibly

introduced to Lord Howe Island. Photo Hallmark Editions.

plants, while pigs rooted around inthe undergrowth, feeding on plants,invertebrates and ground-livingbirds and their eggs. Cats had alsoarrived with whalers in the 1840s,and they were joined by mice in the 1860s.

Land birds were most vulnerable.By 1844, the white gallinule was

extinct, the white-throatedpigeon disappeared after 1853,and many other bird species weredriven from accessible areas tosurvive only on the mountains oron lonely offshore islands.

For a time after the whalingtrade petered out, the island’seconomy was sustained by redonions, which had beencultivated on the island since1848. Their unusually long shelf-life made them sought afterthroughout the southernhemisphere, and by the late 1860s they were being shipped to Sydney.

This new industry was introuble from the start. With theirpredators effectively eliminated,insects attacked the onions inplague proportions and theislanders could only watchhelplessly as their crops weredestroyed. However, it was one ofLord Howe Island’s unique birdsthat would suffer for this.Gardeners could do little againstswarms of insects, but they couldeasily kill the red-frontedparakeets that were attackingtheir gardens. The bird wasextinct after 1869.

The onion industry finallycollapsed in 1876 when smutruined the crop. The island’s 40people faced great hardship as thesupply of goods from outside waschoked. However, theymaintained a simple livelihood,farming their livestock, harvesting

fish, beche-de-mer and sea lettucefrom the sea and in November eachyear collecting the eggs and youngbirds of the mutton bird colony.

In 1876, a report on conditions onLord Howe Island prompted theNSW government to considermoving the population from theisland, but an inquiry by SurveyorFitzgerald found the colony viable,though in need of a new industry togenerate income. He requested thatthe Sydney Botanic Gardens sendspecimens of crop plants such ascoffee that might be cultivated onthe island. As it turned out, it wasthe island’s own kentia palm thatwould provide economic salvation.

Fitzgerald had noted that the palmhad been useful since the earliestdays of settlement.

62 Australian Heritage

Settlers in 1882. Photo courtesy Lord Howe Island Museum.

PICTURED FROM TOP:

Masked booby. Photo Ian Hutton.

Lord Howe Island Gecko. Photo Ian Hutton.

Dendrobium moorei. Photo Ian Hutton.

Corals in the lagoon. Photo Hallmark Editions.

White gallinule, engraving, Peter Mazell,

1789. State Library of Victoria, pb000262.

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The houses are well built of split palm battens, thatchedon the roof and sides with palm leaves. The leaf hangsdown and the stem is bent over one horizontal batten andoutside the next lower, an arrangement that gives a veryclean, white appearance on the inside, somewhatresembling basket work, and very distinct from any otherstyle of building.

When the Sydney Botanic Gardens examined thepalm, they realised it had potential as a decorative plantand was tolerant of low light and low humidity thatwould kill many other palm species. By 1880, severalislanders were laboriously harvesting kentia palm seedsand sending them to America, Australia, Belgium,England and India.

Fitzgerald’s inquiry ended the islanders’ simpleapproach to self-government. The growing awareness ofLord Howe Island’s unique flora and fauna had led to itbeing declared a Forest Reserve by the New SouthWales government in 1878, with Captain RichardArmstrong appointed as Forest Ranger. Over time, heassumed many other governmental roles, includingresident magistrate.

Though Armstrong made many improvements to theisland’s administration and infrastructure, includingdeveloping the market for kentia palms, he was resentedby some islanders, and a petition led to him beingdismissed on claims of embezzlement and illegallysupplying alcohol. He was later exonerated and paidcompensation of £1500. For the next 58 years, theisland was supervised by a series of visiting magistrates,who came as required, often only once a year.

The valuable kentia palm trade brought ships onceagain to Lord Howe Island. In 1893, Burns Philp starteda regular steamship service and, as kentia palms left theisland, the first inquisitive tourists arrived.

Ironically, this increased traffic very nearly destroyedLord Howe Island’s ecology and economy in one blow.On 18 June 1918, the captain of the supply ship SSMakambo blacked out at the bridge and the

uncontrolled vessel ran onto rocks. It was notimmediately apparent that the crew were not the onlyones fleeing the ship. Black rats had arrived.

Five more of the island’s unique birds were soonexterminated and many species of invertebrates,including the Lord Howe phasmid (see page 64) were

either wiped out or greatly reduced innumbers.

Rats also ate kentia seeds, andbecame the islanders’ greatest enemy.Bounties paid on rat tails becameanother source of income forislanders. In another attempt tocontrol them, masked owls wereintroduced during the 1920s but,inevitably, they also preyed on otherspecies and may have caused theextinction of the Lord Howe long-eared bat. It seems likely that theyalso crowded out the Lord Howeboobook owl, which went extinct inthe 1950s.

Rising 330 metres above the sea, Balls Pyramid, 23 kilometres to

the south-east of Lord Howe Island, rises 330 metres above the sea.

It is a remnant of a second shield volcano that is thought to have

been active at about the same time as the Lord Howe volcano.Photo: Colin Totterdell, courtesy Department of the Environment, Water,

Heritage and the Arts.

LEFT: Mount Lidgbird (on the left) and Mount

Gower rise steeply from the sea at the south

of the island. Photo Hallmark Editions.

64 Australian Heritage

As the extraordinary beauty ofLord Howe Island became betterknown, so too did the significanceof its unique and diverse flora andfauna and, in 1981, more thantwo-thirds of the island wasproclaimed a Permanent ParkPreserve. A year later, the entireisland together with offshore islets,Ball’s Pyramid and 145,000hectares of marine environmentwere inscribed on the WorldHeritage List.

Determined efforts have sincebeen made to restore Lord HoweIsland’s original flora and fauna.Several unique animals, notably thewoodhen and the Lord Howe stickinsect, have been rescued from thebrink of extinction. Feral pigs andcats have been eliminated, goats

have been significantly reduced andplans are being made to exterminatethe rats.

Some scientists have suggestedthat restoration of Lord Howe Islandcan go even further. Many extinctendemic animals have closerelatives living nearby. For example,the Lord Howe boobook was closelyrelated to the carefully conservedNorfolk Island/New Zealandboobook hybrid. It has beensuggested that some of these extinctspecies could be replaced by theirliving relatives, an intriguing butcontroversial possibility.

Further ReadingLord Howe Island Rising by Daphne

Nichols, 2006.A Guide to World Heritage: Lord Howe

Island, by Ian Hutton, available at theAustralian Museum bookshop inSydney, and at the Lord Howe IslandMuseum via the museum websitewww.lhimuseum.com ◆

LORD HOWE SURVIVORSWoodhen - an unlikely survivor

One of Lord Howe Island’s most unlikely survivingbirds is the woodhen, a flightless, bantam-sizedrelative of New Zealand’s weka. The woodhen is veryinquisitive and approaches any strange noise, a traitthat made it easy to catch and kill. Humans, pigs, catsand rats all attacked the woodhen until in the 1970sthere were only about 30 left living in the remoterparts of the island’s two mountains.

The Australian Museum took an interest in thebirds’ plight and conducted a recovery program duringthe 1980s. While a captive breeding program was usedto build up their numbers, the birds’ main predators,feral pigs and cats, were eliminated. Today there arearound 250 woodhens living in many parts of theisland, and they are a common sight.

Lord Howe phasmid - a relic from the past

Perhaps the most bizarre inhabitant of Lord HoweIsland is the Lord Howe phasmid, an enormous insect

that grows up to 12 centimetres long and belongs tothe group that includes land lobsters, leaf insects andstick insects. Somehow this insect reached the islandwhen the group was just beginning, and it has retainedsome very primitive characteristics. It comes out onlyat night, and was once so abundant that in 1916 theentomologist, Arthur Lea, could collect them “inpractically unlimited numbers”. This came to anabrupt end two years later with the wreck of theMakembo and the arrival of rats, and the insectdisappeared from Lord Howe Island within a few years.

However, in 1964 a rock climber photographed adead Lord Howe phasmid on Balls Pyramid, provingthey still lived there. In 2001, an intrepid team ofscientists made the journey to the island at night andfound 20 phasmids crawling around a stuntedmelaleuca bush. A successful captive breeding programat Melbourne Zoo has seen phasmid numbers increaseinto the hundreds, and these will be used to recoloniseLord Howe Island once the rats have been eliminated.

Heritage Touring

Visitors to Lord Howe Island canlearn much about the island’shistory and natural heritage atthe Visitor Information Centreand Museum, Phone: (02) 65632111. Resident naturalist,photographer and curator at theMuseum, Ian Hutton, providestours and slide shows thatintroduce the natural treasures ofthis World Heritage island. Phone(02) 6563 2447.

Woodhen and chick. Photo Ian Hutton.

Lord Howe phasmid. Photo Ian Hutton.