Sioma Ngwezi National Park
Like most national parks in Zambia, it is unfenced allowing free movement of the animals, and it is surrounded by buffer zones where hunting is regulated, called Game Management Areas (GMAs). The West Zambezi GMA adjacent to the park is the largest in the country at 35,000 square kilometres.
The park occupies part of large plain lying between the Zambezi, the Cuando River (the upper Chobe River), and the Caprivi Strip, called the Silowana Plains, lying south of the Barotse Floodplain. They were once part of the Kalahari Desert and covered in wind-blown sand-dunes, still present as gentle undulations and a sandy soil. Although the climate is now wetter, permanent rivers do not flow through the plains, only a few seasonal ones, and in the rainy season thousands of small lagoons, typically a couple of hundred metres across, form in the depressions between the dunes. Two ecoregions are well represented in the park, Zambezian Baikiaea woodlands dominated by Zambian Teak trees, which surrounds plains of Western Zambezian grasslands. Along the major rivers surrounding the park is a third ecoregion, Zambezian flooded grasslands.
Skeleton Coast National Park
Death would be preferable to banishment to such a country, declared the early Swedish explorer Charles John Andersson when he encountered tales of the Skeleton Coast. But this area, the Skeleton Coast Park, is now acknowledged as one of Namibia’s greatest treasures, in that it is one of the world’s last great wildernesses.
Initially proclaimed in 1971, in its present form in 1973, it extends from the Ugab River in the south for 500 km to the Kunene River in the north and about 40 km inland. Dense coastal fogs and cold sea breezes caused by the cold Benguela Current add atmosphere to the windswept beaches that are littered with shipwrecks, bones and other debris.
The park also contains rich lichen fields (more than 100 species have been recorded), is a sanctuary for desertdwelling elephants, rhino and lion and the Kunene River mouth is a vital wetland.
South Luangwa National Park
It was initially created as Luangwa Game Reserve in 1904. British conservationist Norman Carr was influential in setting up the South Luangwa National Park. A man ahead of his time, Norman Carr broke the mould of track-and-hunt safari and created conservation based tourism.
In the 1950s, he persuaded the Paramount Chief to set aside a portion of tribal land as a Game Reserve and built the first game viewing camp open to the public in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia). Guests shot with cameras and not rifles; thus the South Luangwa became the home of the photographic and walking safari. Profits from this remote photographic camp in the bush went back into community and eco-tourism in Africa was born. Norman Carr Safaris continues to follow his legacy across Zambia by empowering the local community.
Table Mountain National Park
Hoerikwaggo – “Mountain in the Sea” is the original name given to the mountain chain by the indigenous Khoisan people of the Cape, although of course, the history of the mountain dates back roughly 30 000 years, with evidence tracing as far back as the Stone Age.
The first officially recorded climb to the top of Table Mountain belongs to Portuguese Navigator, Admiral Antonio de Saldanha who in May 1503 anchored his ship in what we know as Table Bay, and climbed to the top via Platteklip Gorge. Since then, many have travelled in de Saldanha’s foot steps and the mountain has been a beacon of hope to many living beneath its glorious splendor.
Today, this iconic mountain chain and New7Wonder of Nature is known as Table Mountain National Park (TMNP) - one of 21 Parks in the South African National Parks (SANParks) stable. Established in 1998, the TMNP is surrounded entirely by a City and for this reason it is fragmented by urban development and privately owned land. This combined with the fact that it is primarily an open access Park with only four managed pay points, has resulted in it being the most visited of all National Parks receiving an annual quota of 4.2 million visits annually.
Prior to the establishment of the Park, a 30 000 hectare area of conservation-worthy land on the peninsula was identified as the Cape Peninsula Protected Natural Environment (CPPNE). Currently the TMNP includes 25 000 hectares of the CPPNE and it is our goal to incorporate the remaining 5 000 hectares into the Park. The TMNP's jurisdiction also includes 1 000 km2 of the seas and coastline around the peninsula.
Also forming part of the TMNP is the Cape Floral Kingdom (CFK), the smallest and richest of the six floral kingdoms that occur on earth. The CFK spans the eastern and western Cape and in June 2004, was declared to be of universal significance to humanity and was inscribed as a Natural World Heritage Site.
Home to an amazing 8 200 plant species - of which around 80% are fynbos, the CFK is also the only kingdom confined to one continent. The significance of this hits home when you consider that the British Isles, 3 ½ times the size, boasts less than 1 500 plant species.
Many of the plants that occur here are endemic – that means that they occur nowhere else on earth. To add to this there are around 1,406 threatened plant species, 300 of which are endangered or critically endangered and 29 plant species are already extinct. It is this combination of high diversity and levels of threat from issues like urbanization, poor fire management and alien species that makes the CFK the world’s hottest floral hot-spot. Add to this the increase in global warming and pollution.
Tankwa Karoo National Park
Named after the Tankwa River that runs through the park as the main water provider in an otherwise semi-desert area, the Park was proclaimed in 1986. Since then, high biodiversity land has been added by SANParks to increase the conservation area from the original 27,064 ha to nearly 146,373 ha in early 2014.
Lying between the Cederberg Mountains and the Great Karoo escarpment, it incorporates three distinct ecosystems - pure desert in the west, open grasslands in the centre and the Roggeveld Mountains in the east. The Roggeveld range is the start of the escarpment and a vital contributor to the park's water supply. The true meaning of the word "Tankwa" is unknown, but it is said to be "Turbid water", "Place of the San" or "Thirst land", all of which fits this arid yet picturesque park so well.
The veld had been severely degraded by livestock overgrazing, and for the first few years it was not open to the public. Humans have lived in the region for at least 10 000 years - first the Bushmen and then the Khoe pastoralists, who moved their livestock with the migration of the wild animals. Then, in the 1700s, the trekboer farmers started using the Tankwa to graze their dropper and merino sheep while moving from the summer heat of the Cederberg to the cooler temperatures on the Karoo escarpment.
Eventually, farmers settled there but the arid climate and poor soils meant that nomadic livestock grazing was not sustainable. Once Tankwa had been proclaimed as a National Park, various farms were bought and added to the conservation area, which today extends to about 146,373 ha. The park is situated within the Succulent Karoo biome, an area renowned for its rare and endemic plant species, rich birdlife, and landscapes and is one of the arid biodiversity hotspots in the world.
Tsau Khaeb National Park
From giant rock arches, meteor craters, fossil and archaeological sites to Africa’s most important shipwreck discovery and some of the most pristine and wild landscapes on the planet, the newly proclaimed Sperrgebiet National Park (SNP) is a jewel in Namibia’s protected area network.Closed to the public following the discovery of a diamond atKolmanskop near Lüderitz by the railway worker, Zacharias Lewala, in 1908, large parts of the Sperrgebiet were left undisturbed for nearly a century. Although this was done to protect the mineral wealth of the area, it also contributed to safeguarding the Succulent Karoo ecosystem, which has the highest diversity of succulent flora globally.
Waterberg Plateau Park
Towering sandstone cliffs, dinosaur footprints, mysterious rock engravings and some of Namibia’s most rare and valuable game species are synonymous with the Waterberg Plateau Park.
In 1904, Waterberg was the scene of a battle between Herero warriors and German colonial forces. The Herero fighters suffered a bitter defeat against their oppressors and thousands of lives were lost in the ensuing retreat across the Omaheke Region into Botswana. Proclaimed as a sanctuary for rare and endangered game species, Waterberg has played a vital role in breeding species for the restocking of other parks and conservation areas.
The area is also home to the last remaining population of Cape Vultures in Namibia.
West Coast National Park
The key conservation areas of West Coast National Park are the Langebaan Lagoon and the offshore islands in Saldanha Bay, which together form the Langebaan Ramsar site, a wetland of international importance. The lagoon has a rich diversity of marine invertebrates and seaweeds and supports approximately 10% of the coastal wader population in South Africa. The offshore islands provide important nesting areas for several red-listed seabird species.
The Langebaan Lagoon was proclaimed as a marine reserve in terms of the Sea Fisheries Act in 1973 and later in 1985, was proclaimed Langebaan National Park with the name later being changed to West Coast National Park. It was on 25 April 1988 that the Langebaan Ramsar site was declared. The initial purpose of the park area was to protect the key conservation areas of the Langebaan Lagoon and associated wetlands as well as the offshore islands in Saldanha Bay. The management focus has since broadened to include the terrestrial surroundings as representative sites of the ecosystem of the West Coast Region.
In 1987, the first expansion of the park occurred, including a dune reclamation scheme, Geelbek and portions of the farms Bottelery, Schrywershoek and Abrahamskraal. In the same year, some 1 800ha of land around Postberg was included on a contractual basis and a hotel site in Langebaan was also included into the park. Today the park, including the lagoon, islands, contractual areas and MPAs, covers some 40 000ha.
About the West Coast National Park
In the South African Context, the saltmarshes of Langebaan are unique in that no river feeds into the lagoon. These salt marshes constitute approximately 32% of the entire saltmarsh habitat in the country, the largest in South Africa. The lagoon is entirely marine with a relatively stable salinity and supports dense populations of molluscs and crustaceans as well as 71 species of different marine algae.
The lagoon also serves as a nursery for the development of juvenile fish; the extensive intertidal areas of the lagoon support up to 55 000 water birds in summer, most of which are waders (23 species), including 15 regular Palaearctic migrants. The five islands of Saldanha Bay to the north of the Lagoon provide a home for nearly a quarter of a million sea birds, many of which are endemic to the nearshore regions of South Africa and Namibia.
Cape Gannets (Monis capensis) and Cape cormorants (Phalocrocorax capensis) are abundant and the largest known colony of Kelp Gulls (Larus doninicanus) in Southern Africa is found on Schaapen Island. WCNP mostly contains strandveld vegetation; with the expansion of the park it also included the Hopefield sand plain fynbos. Both these habitat units are given a 50% irreplaceability rating, however, sand plain fynbos is regarded to be of higher conservation value than strandveld, due to very little being formally conserved and it being more threatened by alien plant invasion.
