![]() With a team of over 100 scientists, educators, volunteers, research students and support staff, the research station has been working to create educational conservation programs, advise Ecuadorian authorities on managing the natural resources of the islands, and better understand the ecosystems to adequately manage them. The Charles Darwin Research Station on Santa Cruz island currently works on research and conservation projects, focused on protecting the terrestrial and marine ecosystems. Today tourists can visit the same islands that enabled Charles Darwin’s groundbreaking work, and witness many of the exotic species that do not exist anywhere else in the world. Galapagos National Park Charles Darwin and the Galapagos Islands: Today The Galapagos Islands provided Charles Darwin with the subjects for his work, and his work has brought attention to the rare species of the Galapagos islands. In the case of the islands, these naturally-selected individuals simply had different traits, and thus the species evolved in different directions. He explained that the animals with the characteristics that made them best suited for their environment had the highest chance of survival, and therefore their offspring would help pass on those traits that had helped them survive. But what was so remarkable about Darwin’s findings was that he was able to solve the mystery of how and why evolution occurred. The theory of evolution had already been proposed by Jean Baptiste de Lamarck, even though Darwin often gets credit for it. Joseph Hooker confirmed that the plant life was unique between islands, and after this point, he put together that every species he had observed varied by island (even though some were harder to spot). It was then that many of them pointed out what Darwin had missed: each island had its own finch species. The significance didn’t sink in until later: he left, writing that he never dreamed that islands made of the same materials, under the same climate, at the same altitude, and only 50-60 miles apart might have such different animals.Ĭharles Darwin returned home and enlisted others to help him sort his specimens. A local told Charles that many of the plants and trees on the islands, like the tortoises, were different from island to island. The largest island in the archipelago, this is where Charles realized how different certain species were. The last stop the Beagle and Charles Darwin made was at Isabela Island. So far, he had gathered a variety of fish, snails, birds, reptiles and insects, but hadn’t been labeling which island they came from as he had assumed all of the islands had the same animals. Unfortunately, iguanas no longer exist on this island, but at the time he recorded there being so many they didn’t have room to pitch a tent.Ĭharles Darwin spent the most time on Santiago island, and it was here that he began to realize the species collected on each were actually different. Here, Darwin observed the many land iguanas- or as he called them, ‘disgusting clumsy Lizards’. Arriving here on October 8, 1835, they found a group of Spaniards who had left Floreana to dry fish and salt tortoise meat. The third island stop was Santiago (formerly James Island). The convicts regularly ate the tortoises, as well as crews of whaling and pirate ships, and they were extinct by 1846. ![]() The Englishman managing the prison, Nicholas Lawson, showed Darwin that you could tell which island each tortoise came from by looking at its shell: they were all different. The locals pointed out that these tortoises seemingly lived infinitely- it appeared that none of them ever died of old age, and the dead tortoises found always had a clear cause of death (such as falling from a cliff). Here, local prisoners told Darwin that each island had its own unique tortoise. Charles Darwin’s second stop was at Floreana Island (formerly known as Charles Island).
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