Carnac Island is aeolianitelimestone remnant of Pleistocene dunes. It is called Ngooloormayup in the language of the WhadjukNoongar people. In 1803, French explorerLouis de Freycinet, captain of the Casuarina, named the islandÎle Pelée. It was also known as Île Lévilian and later Île Berthelot. In 1827, James Stirling changed its name to Pulo Carnac Island in honour of John Rivett Carnac, Second Lieutenant on his ship. "Pulo" is Malay for "Island"; it is not known why Stirling included the term, and it was soon dropped. From, the island served as a whaling station. The whalers transported Perth's first church to the island to be used as a storehouse. It was abandoned within a few years. From October to November 1838, the island was declared by the Swan River Colony colonial government to be a prison for indigenous Australians. The prison consisted of two guards, an overseer named RM Lyon, and three prisoners named Yagan, Danmera, and Ningina. The solitary conditions resulted in the soldiers assisting the prisoners' escape in a stolen government stores boat. In 1884, the colonial government gazetted the island as a quarantine station for Fremantle, but it appears never to have been used for that purpose. In 1916, the Australian Federal Government assumed control over the island for defence purposes, and the island was transferred back to the State of Western Australia in 1961.
Fauna
The island is home to Australian sea lions, bottlenose dolphins and a large range of marine bird life. New Zealand fur seals are frequent visitors. Rabbits inhabited the island in abundance from 1827 to 1897, but were eradicated in 1969. It is particularly noted for the abundance of snakes, particularly tiger snakes, which live there. The island is densely populated with up to three tiger snakes in every. For this reason, very few people venture away from the beach. There is no permanent fresh water, providing a challenge for the animals that live there. The origins of the tiger snakecolony has attracted significant debate and research into how that species has adapted to a harsh island habitat. King skinks also inhabit the island, and there is evidence of confrontation between king skinks and tiger snakes. In November 2006, naturalist David Attenborough visited the island with a BBCfilm crew to record a reptile documentary, in which Attenborough provided commentary on the blindness of many of the island's tiger snakes. This is caused by birds defending their chicks by pecking at the snakes' eyes. These blind snakes survive and thrive, relying upon scent and eating immobile prey such as seabird chicks. Carnac Island is the only place where this has been observed. Male tiger snakes largely out-number female tiger snakes on the island, which is another curiosity of the island's tiger snake colony. Carnac Island is classified as an Important Bird Area because it supports a large colony of the vulnerablefairy tern, as well as small numbers of other nesting seabirds.
