Dog Islands are a small group of islets among the British Virgin Islands in the Caribbean.

The islands originally received their names from sailors who heard barking when they moored there, and assumed that they must be dogs. However, the barking noises were made by Caribbean monk seals. The sailors also regarded the Caribbean monk seal as a good source of fresh seal meat, and as a result, they are now extinct.

Geography

The Dog Islands are situated about north east off the main island of Tortola and about off the north west of Virgin Gorda in the strait Sir Francis Drake Channel. The coordinates of the main islet are 18°28′96″N and 64°27′70″W.

The uninhabited islets are of volcanic origin and have a total area of about

The group consist of 5 islets:

• Great Dog Island, main islet, about

• George Dog Island, about

• West Dog Island, about

• and the subgroup Seal Dogs about north east off Great Dog Island with

• East Seal Dog Island, about and

• Little Seal Dog Island (mostly called West Seal Dog), about

Situated west off George Dog and within the same sub-group lies the small islet Cockroach Island.

History

The first European sighting of the Virgin Islands was by Christopher Columbus in 1493 on his second voyage to the New World. Columbus gave the area the fanciful name (Saint Ursula and her 11,000 Virgins), shortened to (The Virgins), after the legend of Saint Ursula.

Today the waters around the islets are a popular site for scuba diving (3).

West Seal Dog nowadays is a BVI National Park.

See also

• Dog Island and Isle of Dogs, for similarly-named places

References

External links

• About "The Dogs"

• Map of "The Dogs"

• About Seal Dogs

• About West Dog

• About dive sites at "The Dogs"