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Jarvis Island
A lonely equatorial island in a sea of plenty
Jarvis Island lies just south of the equator in the central Pacific, about 1,300 nautical miles south of Hawaii. It is a low, sandy coral island of less than two square miles, with no fresh water and little rain. Claimed under the Guano Islands Act in the 1850s, it was mined for guano until 1879, and like Baker and Howland it was settled by young colonists from Hawaii between 1935 and 1942 to strengthen the American claim.
What Jarvis lacks on land it makes up for in the water. An equatorial current wells up against the island, bringing cold, nutrient-rich water to the surface and feeding dense coral reefs, schools of fish, sharks and large seabird colonies. The island has been a national wildlife refuge since 1974 and lies within the Pacific Islands Heritage Marine National Monument, one of the largest protected areas of ocean on Earth.