Yap Island

Image 1.
Source: http://www.missingaircrew.com/images/yap.jpg

The island of Yap is one of the four island states that make up the Federated Microstate's of Micronesia. (Image 1). Due to its relative obscurity and remoteness little work has been done in order to examine the islands remaining tropical forest. According to Benowitz and colleagues Yap only has 41.3 cubic kilometers of its original forest remaining on the island. (Benowitz 2012). This is in direct contrast with the 28.6 square miles (69.5 square kilometers) that Donnegan and his partners came up with as to the total remaining forest on the island. (Donnegan 12).  These differences are the reason why it is necessary to try and analyze what has happened to Yap's forest. It is this unknown in the quantity and location of forest remaining that I am trying to answer. According to the World Wildlife Fund the forests on Yap are considered to be in a Critical/Endangered state. (World Wildlife Fund).  This leaves it the forest in the most seriously threatened category of measure and only one notch above extinction. It is because of the threat of possibly losing the forests of Yap that it is necessary to identify the remaining tropical forest on the island. The goal of this is to know where to focus any conservation efforts and at the same time  to verify the figures that Benowitz and Donnegan have provided. At the same time it is also a necessary to attempt to examine and explain who or what has caused the loss of so much of the tropical forest on the island.

Image 2.
Source: http://www.dankainmicronesia.com/maps.html