Puerto Rico is the smallest in the group of islands known as the Greater Antilles, located in the Atlantic Ocean. Next to the Lesser Antilles, South America and Central America, the Greater Antilles encompass the Caribbean Sea. The following map shows the Caribbean region. Puerto Rico is some 1,000 miles (1,600 Km) southeast of Miami, Florida and some 500 miles (800 Km) north of Venezuela. The Puerto Rico’s location provides a tropical climate the whole year through, which also causes it to be hit by hurricanes and tropical storms with some frequency, mostly from the northwest region of Africa. It really consists of several islands and islets. The main one is Puerto Rico, proper, the largest, approximately 100 by 35 miles (160 by 60 Km) in size. The islands of Vieques and Culebra are relatively near the easternmost part of Puerto Rico. Vieques and Culebra are municipalities of Puerto Rico. These three are the only islands that are permanently inhabited. Some other important islands are Mona, 72 Km to the west of Puerto Rico, currently an important natural reserve with flora and fauna of great value; Monito, not far from Mona and Desecheo, visible from Puerto Rico’s west coast. The climate varies, depending on the location, from humid in the northeast region, where there is the El Yunque pluvial forest (the only tropical forest that is part of the United States Forest Service) to arid in the southwest region, where there is the is the Guánica Dry Forest. This situation is caused by the interaction between the Central Mountain range that crosses the island from Yabucoa, in the southeast, to Mayagüez, in the west, and the Trade winds coming from the Atlantic Ocean. Puerto Rico es una isla montañosa. In the center, the Central mountain range and the mountain of Cayey they form an axis from this to west that almost crosses the whole island. Although the mountains and the near hills to them cover most of the territory, in the north of the island a coastal plain of about 19 kms of width extends and in the other south, something more narrow, of about 13 kms. Most of this mountainous system is more near the southern coast than of the northern one and their hillsides are generally sharper in their southern slope. In the northeast of the country he/she is the mountain of Luquillo, mountainous system that he/she understands the region of more extensive pluvisilva of the island. Sierra of Cayey: Puerto Rican mountain that is part of the Central mountain range of the country. To more height, in the mountainous border, coffee is cultivated and the grasses are exploited. Hill of Tip or Hill of Jayuya: summit and maximum altitude of Puerto Rico (1.338 m) that next to Rosa (1.267 m) and Guilarte (1.204 m), they form the biggest heights in the Central mountain range, which occupies the practical entirety of the island. It is located toward the center of the mountain range, near the town of Jayuya. This hill that has left forming from the cretácico, begins with contributions of rocks volcanic, diverse phases of deposition of sedimentary materials, in general calcareous, and diverse plegamiento phases that you/they put an end to risings pliocenos. The later erosion will make honor to the topónimo. The altitude that refreshes something the tropical climate of the coast and the topography but accident victim, they have preserved some formations of tropical forest as the call tropical forest of the Caribbean, with the caobilla like singular species.
Puerto Rico’s most important cities are: San Juan, the capital and largest city, with 426,832 inhabitants in 1990; Bayamón, 220,262 inhabitants; Ponce, 187,749 inhabitants; Carolina, 177,806 inhabitants; Caguas, 133,447 inhabitants; Mayagüez, 100,371 inhabitants, and Arecibo, 93,385 inhabitants. Administrative division: 78 municipalities.
Other important rivers are: Grande de Arecibo, Grande de Añasco, Guajataca, Grande de Manatí, La Plata, Grande de Loíza and Culebrinas. None of the rivers is navigable by large vessels. The fluvial system of Puerto Rico is made up of rivers, lagoons, lakes, springs, etc. It has several relatively short rivers; in some of them, dams have been built to obtain hydroelectric power, creating small reservoirs, among which that of the Yauco river stands out. To the north of the central mountain range there are more rivers, which are longer and wider. To the south, just the opposite happens: fewer rivers, narrower and shorter. They have a significant value for the country because they are the main natural source of electric power production and also very much used for irrigation in farming. Out of more than 1,200 streams of water, only some 50 can be classified as rivers; the others are actually creeks or brooks. The main rivers are La Plata (73 km), Grande de Añasco (65 km), Grande de Loiza, the most important and fastest-flowing, and Grande de Arecibo (both 64 km long), Bayamón (41 km) and Culebronas (40 km). Also, worth mentioning are the rivers Cebuco, Manatí, Yauco, Portugués, Jacaguas, Guyanes, Yagüez and Patillas. Underground rivers, like in any other place, are very few. In May of 1995, the rationing of water was decreed. The worst drought in thirty years seemed to come close to its end, but the effects persisted due to the lack of maintenance of the hydraulic system.
The Puerto Rican hydrographic system includes a series of artificial lakes. Almost all have been created by means of dams to use their waters. Caonillas, Dos Bocas, Guajataca, Patillas, Guayabal and Carite are among the most important ones. There are hardly any natural lakes and those that exist are very small. One of the natural lakes is that of Cidra and that of Loiza. Generally near the coast, we find small water deposits that we call lagunas (lagoons or ponds). Noteworty, in the northern area, are the lagoos of San José (between San Juan and Carolina), Tortuguero (in Vega Baja), Piñones and Terrecilla (between Loiza and Carolina), Los Corozos (between San Juan and Carolina), Del Condado (in San Juan). In the west, Cartagena and Joyuda (in Cabo Rojo); and in the east, Aguas Prietas (in Fajardo). They are also several important thermal water springs, such as los Baños de Virella, in Arroyo; the Baños de Quintanilla, near Ponce; but the best-known and most famous ones for their sulfurous waters are los Baños de Coamo. In the Reserve of Tortuguero there is Puerto Rico’s fresh water lagoon. The lagoon and the wetlands that skirt it serve as habitat for several species of carnivorous plants, caimans and other rare or endemic fauna and flora species. Caves and springs are some of the attractions of this natural reserve located to the north of the island of Puerto Rico.
In Puerto Rico thousands of varieties of tropical plants grow, such as the kapok (Ceiba), the royal poinciana (Flamboyant), the breadfruit tree and the coconut palm (Palmae). In the northeastern part of the island, in the rain forest area, ferns, orchids and mahogany trees proliferate, Jacaranda or “sacred stick,” oak and cinchona, inter alia. A section of this area belongs to the El Yunque forest reserve. In the southwest, a much drier area, there are numerous cacti and weeds. Most of the forests were cut down during the colonial time for the purpose of opening suitable spaces for agriculture; but, in spite of the efforts made since 1935 to repopulate the area, forest farming is not yet an outstanding industry.
In Puerto Rico there are no big mammals. The iguanas, snakes, small lizards and also bats are plentiful. The island has an animal that has not been found anywhere else in the world: the coquí, a small frog that emits at night a clear and loud sound from the branches of the trees. Among the fish that inhabit its coastal waters barracudas, mackerels, tunas, lobsters and oysters prevail. Its coast also shelters the manatee, a marine mammal after which a town in the island’s northern region has been named. Also important are birds, such as the nightingale, the canaries and the rare parrot of Puerto Rico. Thanks to the fact that Mona island is 72 Km to the west off the island and that the voyage through the Mona Passage is dangerous, the man's intervention has been minimum. This condition favors the conservation of endemic fauna species. One of these species that abundantly occur is the hermit crab. After the new moon of August, thousands of hermit crabs begin their slow descent from the island’s plateau to spawn on the sandy beach of Sardinera. The island of Culebras, located to the east, is encircled by sixteen islands that provide an ideal habitat for the nesting of 13 species of marine birds. Culebra’s Wild Life Shelter serves as habitat for a large colony of dark gulls that nest every year in a peninsula on the island.
