The Okavango Delta in Botswana is likely one of the world’s largest inland deltas. Whereas most river deltas often result in an ocean, the Okavango River empties onto open land, flooding the savanna and creating a singular and ever-changing inland delta.
The Okavango Delta
We’ve pulled collectively 10 attention-grabbing information in regards to the Okavango Delta, considered one of Africa’s most intriguing wildlife locations.
In this article, I am going to share 22 interesting facts about the Okavango Delta.
1. The complete southwestern a part of the Okavango Delta is as dry as a bone. The annual flood from the Okavango’s catchment was at its lowest ranges this yr. The low water discovered empty rivers and it’s unlikely that the trickle will attain Maun this yr. The Thaoge River move into Lake Ngami died within the mid-1900s.
2. Scorching and dry September and October are additionally notably good months to go to the Okavango Delta as thirsty animals are concentrated in monumental numbers on its fringes (the Moremi Game Reserve is especially rewarding presently) whereas the November to April wet summer season sees the Okavango Delta flooding away.
3. Throughout its 15,000 sq. kilometers, the Okavango Delta may be very flat, various simply two meters in peak.
4. The Okavango is produced by seasonal flooding. The Okavango River drains the summer (January–February) rainfall from the Angola highlands and the surge flows 1,200 km (750 mi) in round one month.
5. The delta swells virtually thrice in dimension between March and August. It fluctuates between 6,000 sq. kilometers to roughly 15,000.
6. The Okavango Delta is deemed one of many world’s premier wilderness areas. Elephants, buffaloes, giraffes, hippos, antelope, leopards, hyenas, zebras, and crocodiles are all examples of animals that you simply would possibly see. In the course of the dry season, round 260,000 mammals congregate across the delta.
7. The Okavango Delta is a vital wildlife space protected by each the Moremi Game Reserve on its jap edge and the quite a few wildlife concessions inside Ngamiland. Nonetheless, the Delta is understood for its excellent wildlife with large inhabitants of mammals and wonderful birding, notably within the breeding season.
8. The Okavango Delta has greater than 150,000 islands. Some are just some meters broad whereas the bigger islands will be longer than 10 kilometers.
9. The supply of the Okavango Delta flood truly lies within the extraordinarily moist highlands of Angola. (Angola lies to the north of Botswana.) From right here the Cubango River flows south, by means of Namibia, away from the ocean. Gathering ever extra water till it lastly reaches Botswana, the place the river turns into referred to as the Okavango.
10. Ngamiland is in North West Botswana the place around 40% of the working inhabitants are employed within the tourism trade. Roughly 100,000 folks keep on the 60 odd lodges and campsites within the Okavango Delta contributing drastically to the native economic system.
11. Many individuals take pleasure in water-based safaris within the delta, traversing the waterways on a conventional mokoro canoe. These conventional boats have been as soon as comprised of a carved out tree trunk, nonetheless, now they’re made out of extra environmentally-friendly fiberglass.
12. In Botswana, crocodiles are mostly present in and around Chobe River and the Okavango Delta. They reside in lakes, rivers, and swamps and will be noticed in estuaries and mangrove swamps. The Nile crocodile can exceed 1000kgs in weight, the load of the average SUV.
13. Animals aren’t the one inhabitants of the delta. The BaSarwa live within the Moremi Game Reserve on the eastern side. The 5 tribes use the world for fishing, rising crops, and searching.
14. In 2014, the Okavango Delta grew to become the 1,000th place to be enlisted as a UNESCO World Heritage Web site. It was additionally voted as one of many Seven Pure Wonders of Africa the yr before.
15. The Okavango Delta is dwelling to 530 hen species together with the extraordinarily uncommon Pel’s Fishing Owl, the world’s solely fish-eating owl.
16. Tragically, a number of the animals within the Okavango Delta are endangered. Particularly, the black rhino has inhabitants of simply 5 whereas the white rhino sits at roughly 35.
17. The Okavango Delta is 6,000 sq. kilometers (2,316 sq. miles). Nonetheless, when the floodwaters arrive within the winter months from March to September, the delta triples in dimension, to about 15,000 sq. kilometers (5,791 sq. miles).
18. The Okavango Delta is protected by each it’s standing as a RAMSAR site and itemizing as a World Heritage Site. These mechanisms shield these fragile surroundings and type the premise for the shut monitoring and management of access to the world.
19. The Okavango Delta is comparatively new in geological phrases—solely a meager 60 000 years previous. Before the formation of the delta, for some two million years, the Okavango River flowed properly by means of Botswana and drained into a large lake someplace within the area of the Makgadikgadi pans in Botswana.
20. The Okavango Delta (or Okavango Grassland) (previously spelled “Okovango” or “Okovanggo”) in Botswana is a swampy inland delta-shaped the place the Okavango River reaches a tectonic trough within the central a part of the endorheic basin of the Kalahari.
21. Okavango Delta – the well-known safari attraction in Botswana. The Okavango Delta has a very particular wildlife range and it is accurately regarded as considered one of Africa’s finest safari locations all yr spherical. Camps and lodges are of an exceptional standard. Their lodges are notably effectively fitted to first-timers to Africa.
22. Referred to as the “Jewel of the Kalahari”, the Okavango Delta in Botswana is a kaleidoscopic maze of waterways spread over 15,000 kilometers of arid land.
