Jacquemart Island, one of the islets surrounding Campbell Island in New Zealand, lies 1 km (1⁄2 nmi) south of Campbell Island and is the southernmost island of New Zealand.
Jacquemart Island consists of a stack with an area of 19 ha (47 acres), being about 750 m (2,500 ft) in length by 500 m (1,600 ft) in width and surrounded by precipitous cliffs at least 30 m (100 ft) high at their lowest. Its highest point is about 200 m (650 ft) asl. It is an eroded remnant of basalticlavas originally laid down on a sedimentary base.
Because of its inaccessibility from the sea, the first visit by humans to the island did not take place until 29 December 1980 when a small party of scientists was landed by helicopter on the summit ridge for a 90-minute survey. Subsequent short visits were made in 1984 and 1997.[3][4]
Flora and fauna
Much of the area of the island above the cliffs is covered with tussock grassland on a substratum of peat undermined with petrel burrows. The environment includes herbfield communities, rock and ledge communities, as well as lichens and cushion plants.[3]
Until the Campbell Islands were cleared of introduced rats in 2001, Jacquemart was also the last refuge of the Campbell snipe, a subspecies of Subantarctic snipe first discovered in 1997 and described in 2009. After the eradication of rats, the snipe began to recolonise the rest of the group, with a small breeding population discovered in 2005 on southern Campbell Island opposite Jacquemart.[4][7]
^BirdLife International. (2012). Important Bird Areas factsheet: Campbell Island (and outliers). Downloaded from http://www.birdlife.org on 22 January 2012.
Map of Campbell Island with several surrounding islets, including Jacquemart Island lying south of the main island and Dent island lying northwest of the main island
