Portugal - Selvagens Islands

The Selvagens Islands and their surrounding waters, from coastal to the deep sea, are a unique example, found nowhere else in the world, of a very well preserved and pristine macaronesian biota, also with extremely important geological features. Selvagens Islands are a very remote and isolated group of Portuguese oceanic islands, located in the Northeastern Atlantic, 293km from Madeira Island, Portugal. They are comprised by three islands of volcanic origin: Selvagem Grande (245ha), Selvagem Pequena (20ha), Ilhéu de Fora (8ha) and several islets, shaped specially by marine abrasion. Due to their geographic location, isolation and difficult conditions for colonisation, they offer habitats that are representative and important for the conservation of the marine and terrestrial biodiversity of Macaronesia and the world, particularly for species which are endemic and/or that are threatened and vulnerable on a world-wide scale, such as Argyranthemum thalassophylum (Code: 1824), Pelagodroma marina hypoleuca (Code: A389), Caretta caretta (Code: 1224, priority species) and many invertebrates. This gives the Selvagem Islands an extremely valuable marine and terrestrial natural heritage of great ecological and scientific value, as well as an unequalled landscape. Geologically these islands are also remarkable, representing a small part of a very characteristic and unique volcanic edifice.