Manus Island, Admiralty Islands, Papua New Guinea Photograph by Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program   Islands off the northeast coast of mainland Papua New Guinea Tropical and Subtropical Moist Broadleaf Forests   800 square miles (2,100 square kilometers) -- about the size of Rhode Island Critical/Endangered

· Islands of Mystery
· Special Features
· Did You Know?
· Wild Side
· Cause for Concern
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Islands of Mystery

The thick rain forests of Papua New Guinea conceal many mysteries. The Admiralty Islands, a small group of islands just north of the mainland, are particularly isolated and remote. This rugged land is home to rare species of birds and bats, some not seen anywhere else on Earth, and is nearly covered with forest. Although the islands are considered an important area of biodiversity, to this day relatively little is known about them.

Special Features

If you walked through the dense lowland rain forests of Manus Island, the largest of the Admiralty Islands, you would see few, if any, people. The island group is considered the smallest and least populated province in Papua New Guinea. But where isolation has kept the human population down, it has fostered the evolution of many different plants and animals. Some 1,500 native plant species grow here. These tropical islands are also home to significant stands of endemic Calophyllum and Sararanga trees, which are valued by biologists but also by the timber industry.

	The small green tree snail--a native of this ecoregion--was the first land snail to be listed as threatened by the World Conservation Union (IUCN).

Wild Side

Living throughout this ecoregion are several endemic species of large fruit-eating bats, including the Admiralty flying fox and the Andersen’s bare-backed fruit bat. In a rainforest environment, bats play essential roles as pollinators and seed dispersal agents, yet many species are threatened with extinction. Birds endemic to the region include the Manus owl, black-headed pitta, and white-naped friarbird. The pitta, for one, is considered a strong candidate to be the "flagship" species of these islands. What this means is that the pitta plays a crucial role in ecological process, is endemic, and is sensitive to change--its status can therefore be an indicator of the welfare of the island in general.

Cause for Concern

Although some of the forests at the interior of the larger islands are still intact, the forests on many of the smaller islands have been converted to coconut plantations. Commercial logging and conversion of forests to agricultural lands continue to be the greatest threats to the ecoregion. The black-headed pitta is just one of several endemic species that are endangered.

For more information on this ecoregion, go to the World Wildlife Fund Scientific Report.