Ducie atoll: its history, physiography and biota

Abstract

Remote and uninhabited Ducie Atoll (24° 40’S, 124° 47’W), more commonly known as Ducie Island, lies 293 miles east of Pitcairn and 830 miles west-northwest of Easter Island. It is the easternmost atoll of the vast Indo-Pacific biogeographical region that possesses a pure, though impoverished Polynesian biota. Clipperton Atoll (10° 18'N, 109° 13'W), the one atoll in the Pacific that lies to the east of Ducie, has a fauna and flora with a significant admixture of Eastern Pacific elements (Sachet, 1962; Salvat and Erhardt, 1970).