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‘Such strange blossoms flower out of the very dust.’ Robert Hichens (1897)

In defiance of this arid climate and with the help of its magic, the island’s wildlife prospers nonetheless. Bizarre animals and plants that exist only on Socotra are infinite. It ranks number four on the world list of endemism: with 37 percent of all plants counted up to date that only grow on this isle and nowhere else on earth and 77 more kinds of endemic plants than the Galapagos archipelago.