Lord Howe Island
Natural Wanders…
exploring the natural world through writing

Howe Glorious (Lord Howe Island)
AUSTRALIAN WELLBEING
No. 54
by Linda Lee Rathbun
photos by Steven David Miller

Howe Glorious! (Lord Howe Island)
text by Linda Lee Rathbun
photos by Steven David Miller

Lying between Australia and New Zealand is that lonely stretch of Pacific Ocean known as the Tasman Sea. Suddenly from the depths of a submerged mountain range known as the Lord Howe Rise, the remnants of an ancient shield volcano rise abruptly through the surface of the water to form a crescent of land. This is Lord Howe Island, a curving slice of uncut jade melting into a swirl of liquid blue crystal. It is a small subtropical gem that sparkles with an abundance of unique wonders.
To begin with, the last thing you would expect to find this far south is a coral reef. At this temperate latitude there aren't any, anywhere else on earth. Yet here is an island fringed by a dazzling necklace of over 90 coral species and decorated with those neon colored fish that you normally find on the Great Barrier Reef. Lord Howe is bathed in a cocktail of equatorial and temperate currents, each bringing an assortment of fish and invertebrate life that makes for the most unlikely of integrated aquatic neighborhoods. The land flora and fauna are also unique, evolved over six million years in isolation.
My first glimpse from above jolted me out of a stupor induced by a two hour flight from Sydney. The island is instantly captivating. At the center is a billowing verdant quilt of dense forests and lush clearings. To the north the hills scoop upward, then plunge abruptly into the sea. A long sliver of sand spills into a sapphire and aquamarine lagoon, forming the reef-fringed west coast. Beaches, bays, cliffs and promontories bite wedges into the east coast, creating a jagged line. To the south the island changes shape. The ascending incline of Mount Lidgbird rises into a colossal wall of basalt rock that forms a virtually inaccessible tower of 777 meters. It then falls and rises again to the twin peak of Mount Gower, which in turn drops like the wall of a citadel straight into the ocean. These two peaks are almost always covered in cloud, lying over them like a white shroud hiding the secret castles of mythological gods.
The people of Lord Howe seem to love their little island. Many of the 300 islanders are proud descendants of the first white European settlers who arrived in the early 1800's and began a business provisioning the passing whaling ships of the Middle Whaling Grounds. Isolated from the mainland of Australia by over 500 kilometers of ocean, the settlers formed an independent and resourceful community that to this day remains tightknit, happy and resentful of too much interference from 'mainlanders'.
The way everyone seems to care for Lord Howe, locals and visitors alike, filled me with admiration. Because of Lord Howe's outstanding natural wonders, the island was listed on the United Nations World Heritage list in 1982. Seventy-five percent of Lord Howe Island, along with all of its satellite islands and rocks, is an Australian Permanent Park Preserve under the control of the New South Wales Parks and Wildlife Service and the Minister for the Environment.
The park rangers are still at war with the rats, introduced by a shipwreck in 1918 with catastrophic results. Though they don't enjoy it, the rangers are also destroying the last of the feral goats and pigs. Islanders are no longer allowed to keep cats as pets, a major step in preserving the island's outstanding bird life. The eradication of introduced weeds is also an ongoing project, combined with reafforestation wherever possible. Conservation is a high priority with the Lord Howe Island Board, it dominates every aspect of their control over most of the affairs of the island. I thought the Board's bravest and wisest decision was to severely limit the number of tourist beds allowed on the island. Just under 400 people can stay at any one time. Unlike so many other places, the Board has no intention of ruining the very thing that makes Lord Howe so attractive. If you fall in love with Lord Howe and want to spend the rest of your life there, your only chance is to marry one of the locals!
Actually it is impossible not to fall in love with Lord Howe. The island, ravishing from end to end, is only twelve kilometers long and a few kilometers wide. The only road, partly shaded by a canopy of trees, runs along the west side. There are cars, but most people get around of motor scooters or bicycles. The islanders are, for the most part, involved in the two mainstays of the island: tourism and the Kentia Palm industry. Almost three million Kentia Palm seedlings, germinated in the island's nursery, are exported annually all over the world.
Many islanders seem to arrange their working hours so they can pursue the important things in life. Lawn bowls and golf are very popular with the locals and if a visitor wants to partake he simply shows up at the Bowling Club or Golf Club, borrows the gear that he needs and leaves his money in an Honesty Box. Everyone fishes. A big magnet with the younger generation is Blinky Beach, created by Mother Nature for the sold purpose of surfing. Turquoise waves coil into the shore, happily hurling boards along on their foaming crests.
Lord Howe has been a magnet for visitors for many yeas. Scientific expeditions have found endless reasons to visit: conchologists looking for mollusks, palaeontologists searching for fossilized Meiolania platyceps, a long gone horned turtle. Even the Air Force has an excuse to visit, they like to practice short landings and take offs on the 1,000 meter runway in those huge Hercules airplanes. People used to come by ship, then by Catalina and Sandringham flying boats, now by plane. One visit to Lord Howe never seems to be enough, some people I met had been coming out regularly over the past six decades.
A scenic flight over Lord Howe is almost a must. I found the hour's flight breathtaking in every way. To the northeast were the Admiralty Islands. To the south was Ball's Pyramid, a 552 meter ragged blade of basalt rock that explodes through the water's surface like the Sword Excalibur.
The Admiralty Islands from above were swarming with birds so when I had the chance I went out there. The largest and most accessible of the small group of eight is Roach Island and you can only get there by boat on a calm day at low tide. Clive Wilson, a third generation islander with a friendly and generous nature, took four of us 'birdos' out there late one Friday afternoon. The sky was clouded by thousands of Sooty Terns scolding us from above. Each step was a hazard because the land was pitted with the burrows of nesting Shearwaters and doted with eggs, fluffy chicks and gangly fledglings. Handsome Masked Boobies were everywhere and the odd Grey Ternlet stared back at me with startled black eyes.
If the birds on Roach Island delighted me, those on Lord Howe bewitched me. Sacred kingfishers decorated the branches of trees like rainbow ornaments. Golden whistlers serenaded each other with songs that sparkled. Emerald doves murmured soft worried calls that blended with the sea breeze. On a walk to the south end I met a few of the Lord Howe woodhens. These birds came as close to joining the dodo as any creature dares to get. It had evolved in a place with no predators and so had lost the ability to fly. When man arrived, the defenseless bird had little chance. The numbers plummeted to about six breeding pairs found on the summit of Mount Gower, the only place they were safe from rats. In 1980 a rescue plan was organized and three pairs were captured and helicoptered off the mountain. With the help of incubators, fifteen hatchlings survived the first breeding season and by 1984 seventy-one woodhens had been released into the wild. Today there are about two hundred birds, many pairs living happily on settled land where islanders are proud to include them as members of the family.
Even more abundant than the bird life above is the animated marine life bursting below. Fishermen catch kingfish by the boatload and at Pinetrees where I was staying this was frequently on the menu in a creative range of recipes, all of them delicious. The diving on Lord Howe is kaleidoscopic. Tropical corals grow alongside calcareous algaes in unusual gardens of color. In the lagoon, green turtles feed on sea grass. One was so tame it allowed me to swim beside it while it stopped to gobble food, as though it thought we had a date to dine together. Huge butterfly cod, their spines fluttering about them like swirling flamenco skirts, gathered under ledges in groups of five or six. Off Ned's Beach, on the eastern coast, more coral grew in sprawling clusters that gilded the sea bed. A merry-go-round of trevally and spangled emperors circled around me reflecting more silver light than a mirror ball in a discotheque. The fish are so used to being fed by islanders and guests that they follow snorkellers and divers around like over zealous dive buddies. Moon wrasse and parrotfish scorched past me in a blaze of colors. A small moray eel led me on a merry chase as it slithered through a network of tunnels and holes. McCulloch's anemonefish, endemic to Lord Howe, flourished in the sensuous tentacles of swaying anemones. This was an aquatic Eden, a perfect place to end each day in a technicolor dream.
Aside from bird watching and diving, I also enjoyed many a walk through the subtropical rainforests that cover the permanent preserve areas of Lord Howe. About one third of the island's several hundred species of plants are endemic. There are many kilometers of walking trails cutting through the forests, most of them ending with yet another stunning vista.
I thought the walk through the Valley of Shadows was especially lovely. The ground is riddled with the burrows of flesh-footed shearwaters. About 15,000 pairs come here every year to squabble and howl their way through the nesting season. Banyan trees, twisting mazes of trunks and branches, spread through the forest like a slow invasion of aliens.
When there was anything in particular I wanted to see, all I had to do was rush over to Clive Wilson at the Bike Hire and he would tell me exactly where to go. In fact all the islanders I met seemed anxious that I should see Lord Howe's wonders and the grandeur that makes it so deserving of being a World Heritage Site. Lord Howe comes as close to being a paradise on earth as any place I've ever visited.

THE END