🏖️ Ballast Island (Japan)

Ballast Island, also known as Barasu Island, is a small uninhabited coral island or cay in the Yaeyama chain off the coast of mainland Japan, located between the islands of Iriomote and Hatoma. The island sits at the center of a coral reef composed primarily of species of the stony coral genus Acropora, most numerously Acropora muricata. At least four goby species have been found at the island, as well as a specimen of the moray eel Gymnothorax ryukyuensis.