A different planet of the earth - the socotra island

the island of mystry

Welcome to the Alien lands of Socotra, with strange trees like the Dragon Blood Tree! You would be inclined to think you were transported to another planet - or traveled to another era of Earth’s history.  Socotra Island, which is part of a group of four islands, has been geographically isolated from mainland Africa for the last 6 or 7 million years. The archipelago features narrow coastal plains, a limestone plateau with caves, and mountains which rise to 1,525 meters above sea level.

 

 

 

Socotra is a small Yemeni archipelago of four islands and islets in the Indian Ocean off the coast of the Horn of Africa, about 350 kilometers south of the Arabian peninsula.

Like the Galapagos Islands, this island is teeming with 800 extremely rare species of flora and fauna, a full 1/3 of which are endemic, i.e. found nowhere else on Earth.

Socotra is home to more than 800 species of plants, some 240 of which are endemic to the island, and there are certainly many more plant species that have yet to be discovered. The climate is harsh, hot and dry, and yet - the most amazing plant life thrives there.

A Dragon’s Blood Tree (Dracaena cinnabari) is seen in front of the Skund mountains on the island of Socotra, Yemen. The tree is so named because any injury to the bark results in a deep red liquid excreting from the scar – compared in the past to the "Blood of Dragons".

 

Dragons Blood Tree

The branches spread out into the sky and from below appear to hover over the landscape like so many flying saucers... and from above they have a distinct mushroom look.

There is also the Desert Rose (adenium obesium) which looks like nothing so much as a blooming elephant leg.

A Socotran Fig Tree (Dorstenia gigas) with a bizare swollen trunk that almost has human proportions grows against a limestone rock face on the island of Socotra. The plants are one of over 300 plant species endemic to the island.

HISTORY 

There was initially an Oldoway (or Oldowan) culture in Socotra. Oldoway stone tools were found in the area around Hadibo by V.A. Zhukov, a member of the Russian Complex Expedition in 2008.^[6][7]

Socotra appears as Dioskouridou ("of Dioscurides") in the Periplus of the Erythraean Sea, a 1st-century AD Greek navigation aid. A recent discovery of texts in several languages, including a wooden tablet in Palmyrene dated to the 3rd century AD, indicate the diverse origins of those who used Socotra as a trading base in antiquity.^[8]

In 2001 a group of Belgian speleologists of the Socotra Karst Project made a spectacular discovery. Deep inside a huge cave on the island Socotra they came across a large number of inscriptions, drawings and archaeological objects.^[9][10] As further investigation showed, they were left by sailors who visited the island between the 1st century BC and the 6th century AD. The majority of the texts is written in the Indian Brāhmī script, but there are also inscriptions in South-Arabian, Ethiopian, Greek, Palmyrene and Bactrian scripts and languages. This corpus of nearly 250 texts and drawings thus constitutes one of the main sources for the investigation of Indian Ocean trade networks in the first centuries of our era.^[11]

A local tradition holds that the inhabitants were converted to Christianity by Thomas the Apostle in AD 52. In the 10th century, the Arab geographerAbu Muhammad al-Hasan al-Hamdani stated that in his time most of the inhabitants were Christians. Socotra is also mentioned in The Travels of Marco Polo; Marco Polo did not pass anywhere near the island but recorded a report that "the inhabitants are baptised Christians and have an 'archbishop'" who, it is further explained, "has nothing to do with the Pope in Rome, but is subject to an archbishop who lives at Baghdad". They wereNestorians but also practised ancient magic rituals despite the warnings of their archbishop.^[12]

In 1507, a fleet commanded by Tristão da Cunha with Afonso de Albuquerque landed an occupying force at the then capital of Suq. Their objective was a Portuguese base to stop Arab commerce from the Red Sea to the Indian Ocean, and to liberate the presumed friendly Christians from Islamic rule. Here they started to build a fortress. However, they were not welcomed as enthusiastically as they had expected and abandoned the island four years later, as it was not advantageous as a base.^[13]

The islands passed under the control of the Mahra sultans in 1511. In 1834, the United Kingdom stationed a garrison on the island. Plans were made to make it a coaling station for ships bound for India, but the climate was considered unsuitable and the British left in 1839.^[14] In January 1876, it became a British protectorate along with the remainder of the Mahra State of Qishn and Socotra. The P&O ship Aden sank after being wrecked on a reef near Socotra, in 1897, with the loss of 78 lives.

In October 1967, the Mahra sultanate was abolished. On 30 November 1967, Socotra became part of South Yemen. Since Yemeni unification in 1990 it has been part of the Republic of Yemen.

plants and animals

Socotra is considered the jewel of biodiversity in the Arabian Sea.^[22] In the 1990s, a team of United Nationsbiologists conducted a survey of the archipelago’s flora and fauna. They counted nearly 700 endemicspecies, found nowhere else on earth; only Hawaii, New Caledonia, and the Galapagos Islands have more impressive numbers.^[23]

The long geological isolation of the Socotra archipelago and its fierce heat and drought have combined to create a unique and spectacular endemic flora. Botanical field surveys led by the Centre for Middle Eastern Plants (part of the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh) indicate that 307 out of the 825 (37%) plant species on Socotra are endemic, i.e., they are found nowhere else on Earth.^[24] The entire flora of the Socotra Archipelago has been assessed for the IUCN Red List, with 3 Critically Endangered and 27 Endangered plant species recognised in 2004.^[24]

One of the most striking of Socotra's plants is the dragon's blood tree (Dracaena cinnabari), which is a strange-looking, umbrella-shaped tree. Its red sap was thought to be the dragon's blood of the ancients, sought after as a dye, and today used as paint and varnish.^[24] Also important in ancient times were Socotra's various endemic aloes, used medicinally, and for cosmetics. Other endemic plants include the giant succulent tree Dorstenia gigas, the cucumber tree Dendrosicyos socotranus, the rare Socotran pomegranate (Punica protopunica),Aloe perryi, and Boswellia socotrana.^[25]

The island group also has a rich fauna, including several endemic species of birds, such as the Socotra Starling (Onychognathus frater), the Socotra Sunbird (Nectarinia balfouri), Socotra Bunting (Emberiza socotrana), Socotra Cisticola (Cisticola haesitatus), Socotra Sparrow (Passer insularis),Socotra Golden-winged Grosbeak (Rhynchostruthus socotranus), and a species in a monotypic genus, the Socotra Warbler (Incana incana).^[25] Many of the bird species are endangered by predation by non-native feral cats.^[23] While there are no native amphibians, the reptiles species are over 90 percent endemic to Socotra and include skinks, legless lizards, and one species of chameleon, Chamaeleo monachus.

As with many isolated island systems, bats are the only mammals native to Socotra. In contrast, the coral reefs of Socotra are diverse, with many endemic species.^[25] Socotra is also one of the homes of the Bicyclus anynana.^[26]

Over two thousand years of human settlement on the islands have slowly but continuously changed the environment, and according to Jonathan Kingdon, "the animals and plants that remain represent a degraded fraction of what once existed". The Periplus of the Erythraean Sea says the island had crocodiles and large lizards, and the present reptilian fauna appears to be greatly reduced. Until a few centuries ago, there were rivers and wetlands on the island, greater stocks of the endemic trees, and abundant pasture. The Portuguese recorded the presence of water buffaloes in the early 17th century. Now there are only sand gullies, and many native plants only survive where there is greater moisture or protection from livestock.^[25] The remaining Socotra fauna is greatly threatened by goats and other introduced species, as well as climate change.