Îles Leygues

Les Îles Leygues or the Leygues Islands, occasionally called « les Îles Swain », are a group of small islands and islets that are part of the subantarctic Kerguelen archipelago, a French territory in the southern Indian Ocean.

The Îles Leygues lie across the Passe de la Résolution from Île Howe, and north of the main Kerguelen island of Grande Terre.

Access from the sea is virtually impossible because of extensive banks of giant kelp surrounding the group.

A large colony of Antarctic fur seals occurs which has probably never been hunted and which has enabled the recolonisation of other sites from which the species was formerly exterminated.

Five or six pairs of wandering albatrosses breed there as well as unknown numbers of northern giant petrels and Kerguelen shags.

White and black bird swimming
Wandering albatrosses nest on the islands in small numbers
Map of Kerguelen with the Leygues Islands as Îles Swain