Liguanea Island is an uninhabited granite island in the Australian state of South Australia located 3.7 km south of Cape Carnot at the southern, central point of Eyre Peninsula. It is approximately 2.7 km long, 180 ha in size its elevation above sea level is estimated to be 43 metres.Liguanea Island Geoview.info Accessed 2014-01-10. It is approximately 35 km south-west of Port Lincoln in the Great Australian Bight.Property Location Browser V2 Government of South Australia. Accessed 2014-01-10. The island forms part of the Lincoln National Park.
History
Liguanea Island was named by British explorer Matthew Flinders on 18 February 1802. The following day, Flinders named the nearby headland Cape Wiles "after a worthy friend at Liguanea, in Jamaica." In Flinders' atlas (Plate 17) there is a view of the cape and the island as seen from his ship, The Investigator."Historical Review of Western Coastline" Port Lincoln Times (1934-06-15). Retrieved 2014-01-10.
The same year, French explorer Nicolas Baudin named the island as Ile Guyton.
In 1905, the ship Governor Musgrave called by Liguanea Island while searching for the wreckage of the lost vessel, Loch Vennachar. A newspaper correspondent on the vessel described the island as "a large bare block of forbidding granite some miles in extent.""Search for the Loch Vennachar. Return of the Governor Musgrave." Chronicle, South Australia (1905-09-30). Retrieved 2014-01-10.
In 1914, a buck and two does were placed on Liguanea Island."Unattended Coast Lights. New West Coast Lamps." The Advertiser (1914-06-12). Retrieved 2014-01-10.
The island first obtained protected area status as a fauna conservation reserve declared under the Crown Lands Act 1929-1966 on 16 March 1967.
On 26 May 1980 biodiversity data was collected on Liguanea Island. Among there species recorded were Australian sea-lion, little penguin, Cape Barren goose and bush rat.Explore by location > Liguanea Island Atlas of Living Australia. Accessed 2014-01-10. Little penguin breeding on the island was acknowledged in a 1996 survey of South Australia's offshore islands.
References