Which countries are called west indies
Answers
Answer:
west indies county are called west indies because they belongs to South region
Answer:
West Indies, Spanish Indias Occidentales, French Indes Occidentales, Dutch West-Indië, crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles (3,200 km) long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north. From the peninsula of Florida on the mainland of the United States, the islands stretch 1,200 miles (1,900 km) southeastward, then 500 miles (800 km) south, then west along the north coast of Venezuela on the South American mainland.
West Indies
West Indies
West Indies.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Map showing World distribution of the major religions.
BRITANNICA QUIZ
It’s All in the Name
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Three major physiographic divisions constitute the West Indies: the Greater Antilles, comprising the islands of Cuba, Jamaica, Hispaniola (Haiti and the Dominican Republic), and Puerto Rico; the Lesser Antilles, including the Virgin Islands, Anguilla, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Antigua and Barbuda, Montserrat, Guadeloupe, Dominica, Martinique, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Barbados, and Grenada; and the isolated island groups of the North American continental shelf—The Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands—and those of the South American shelf, including Trinidad and Tobago, Aruba, Curaçao, and Bonaire. (Bermuda, although physiographically not a part of the West Indies, has common historical and cultural ties with the other islands and is often included in definitions of the region.)
Pointe des Châteaux, eastern Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe.
Pointe des Châteaux, eastern Grande-Terre, Guadeloupe.
Courtesy of Guy Legrain
The shape and alignment of the Greater Antilles are determined by an ancient chain of folded and faulted mountains that in Cretaceous times extended from Central America through the Caribbean. Running west-east, this system is now mostly submerged by the Atlantic and the Caribbean, but remnants of it are visible in the Blue Mountains of Jamaica and in the Sierra de los Órganos and the Sierra Maestra in Cuba. Duarte Peak, in the Dominican Republic, another component of this range, rises to 10,417 feet (3,175 metres) and is the highest point in the Caribbean. Besides interior mountain peaks, each Greater Antillean island has an encircling coastal plain.
Trending north-south, another mostly submerged chain of mountains forms the double arc of small islands that make up the Lesser Antilles. Stretching from Saint Kitts to Grenada, the mountainous inner arc consists of volcanic cones, some still active. The outer arc—running from Anguilla to Barbados—is made up of low, flat islands whose limestone surfaces overlie older volcanic or crystalline rocks.
Fumaroles, or volcanic vents, Dominica, Lesser Antilles.
Fumaroles, or volcanic vents, Dominica, Lesser Antilles.
© Joseph/Fotolia
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The West Indies have a tropical maritime climate. Daily maximum temperatures over most of the region range from the mid-80s F (upper 20s C) from December to April to the upper 80s F (low 30s C) from May to November. Nighttime temperatures are about 10 °F (6 °C) cooler. Most islands experience a wet and a dry season; annual rainfall totals range from 30 to 80 inches (800 to 2,000 mm) but reach more than 200 inches (5,000 mm) on the highest peaks. The region’s moisture-laden trade winds produce heavy rainfall on the windward sides of the higher islands. Tropical cyclones (called hurricanes locally) frequently occur between August and October, and relative humidity is high throughout the year.
The forests that once covered most of the West Indies were cut down in many areas by sugar-plantation owners for firewood to heat their refining vats. This practice resulted in soil impoverishment and erosion. Destruction of primeval forest has also occurred as a result of slash-and-burn agriculture. Some countries have recognized the importance of the forests, however, and have passed laws to prevent deforestation. Surviving types of forest include mangrove swamps, which thrive along some coasts; semi-deciduous woodland, found in the Leeward Islands (the northern group of the Lesser Antilles; the southern group is called the Windward Islands) and other areas of prolonged drought; tropical rainforest of the wet lowlands; montane forest, occurring in wet highlands; and elfin woodland, which occurs on exposed peaks.