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Kilombero Nature Forest Reserve
The Udzungwa Mountains are a mountain range in south-central Tanzania. The mountains are mostly within Iringa Region, south of Tanzania's capital Dodoma. The Udzungwa Mountains are part of the Eastern Arc Mountains, and are home to a biodiverse community of flora and fauna with large numbers of endemic species. The mountains are home to the Hehe people, and the name Udzungwa comes from the Kihehe word “Wadzungwa", which means the people who live on mountainsides. Iringa is the largest settlement in the mountains, and the regional headquarters. Geography The Undzungwa Mountains cover an area of 16,131.40 km², the largest of the Eastern Arc ranges. The highest peak in the range is Luhombero at . The mountain range extends generally northeast-southwest. The Usangu Plain lies to the northwest, drained by the Great Ruaha River and its tributaries. The Great Ruaha River separates the Udzungwa Mountains from the Rubeho Mountains and Uvidunda Mountains to the northeast. The Kilom ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iringa Region
Iringa Region (''Mkoa wa Iringa'' in Swahili) is one of Tanzania's 31 administrative regions. The region covers an area of . The region is comparable in size to the combined land area of the nation state of Guinea Bissau. Iringa Region is bordered to the east by Morogoro Region and south by Njombe Region. On the west the region is bodered by Mbeya Region. Dodoma Region and Singida Region border Iringa on the north. The regional capital is the city Iringa for which the city is named after. According to the 2012 census, the region has a total population of 941,238. Iringa Region is home to Ruaha National Park, Tanzania's second national largest park. Geography The elevation of Iringa varies from 900 to 2,300 meters above sea level. A significant scarp that can reach 800 meters in height and is the eastern portion of the Great Rift Valley surrounds the area on all sides. Iringa is hence situated in Tanzania's southern highlands, bordering the Mbeya, Njombe, Morogoro, Dodoma, and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rain Shadow
A rain shadow is an area of significantly reduced rainfall behind a mountainous region, on the side facing away from prevailing winds, known as its leeward side. Evaporated moisture from water bodies (such as oceans and large lakes) is carried by the prevailing onshore breezes towards the drier and hotter inland areas. When encountering elevated landforms, the moist air is driven upslope towards the peak, where it expands, cools, and its moisture condenses and starts to precipitate. If the landforms are tall and wide enough, most of the humidity will be lost to precipitation over the windward side (also known as the ''rainward'' side) before ever making it past the top. As the air descends the leeward side of the landforms, it is compressed and heated, producing foehn winds that ''absorb'' moisture downslope and cast a broad "shadow" of dry climate region behind the mountain crests. This climate typically takes the form of shrub–steppe, xeric shrublands or even deserts ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grey-faced Sengi
The grey-faced sengi (''Rhynchocyon udzungwensis'') is a species of elephant shrew that is endemic to the Udzungwa Mountains of south-central Tanzania. The discovery of the species was announced in January 2008; only 15 species of elephant shrew were known until then, and the last discovery was made more than 120 years ago. As the name implies, the species is characterised by a distinctive grey face and a black rump, as well as being larger than the other species of elephant shrews. Description The fur of this sengi is sparse and glossy with a gray facial coloration and bright red pelage. A wide maroon stripe is noted along the back of the animal, as well as jet-black hindquarters with a light brown belly and tail. In comparison to the other sengis, the grey-faced sengi is larger in proportion and the upper tooth row is longer. The mean length of this species is , while the mean weight is . At , this species is about 25% larger than any other known sengi. Taxonomy The grey ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
African Bush Elephant
The African bush elephant (''Loxodonta africana'') is one of two extant African elephant species and one of three extant elephant species. It is the largest living terrestrial animal, with bulls reaching a shoulder height of up to and a body mass of up to . It is distributed across 37 African countries and inhabits forests, grasslands and woodlands, wetlands and agricultural land. Since 2021, it has been listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List. It is threatened foremost by habitat destruction, and in parts of its range also by poaching for meat and ivory. It is a social mammal, travelling in herds composed of cows and their offspring. Adult bulls usually live alone or in small bachelor groups. It is a herbivore, feeding on grasses, creepers, herbs, leaves, and bark. The menstrual cycle lasts three to four months, and females are pregnant for 22 months, the longest gestation period of any mammal. Taxonomy ''Elephas africanus'' was the scientific name proposed by Johann Fri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Udzungwa Red Colobus
The Udzungwa red colobusUdzungwa Red Colobus. ARKive. Accessed 2008-07-20 (''Piliocolobus gordonorum''), also known as the Uzungwa red colobus or Iringa red colobus, is a species of in the family Cercopithecidae. It is to riverine and montane forest in the in |
Kipunji
The kipunji (''Rungwecebus kipunji''), also known as the highland mangabey, is a species of Old World monkey that lives in the highland forests of Tanzania. The kipunji has a unique call, described as a 'honk-bark', which distinguishes it from its relatives, the grey-cheeked mangabey and the black crested mangabey, whose calls are described as 'whoop-gobbles'. The kipunji was independently discovered by researchers from the Wildlife Conservation Society, the University of Georgia, and Conservation International, in December 2003 and July 2004, making it the first new African monkey species discovered since the sun-tailed monkey in 1984. Originally assigned to the genus ''Lophocebus'', genetic and morphological data showed that it is more closely related to the baboons (genus ''Papio'') than to the other mangabeys in the genus ''Lophocebus''. Scientists subsequently assigned it to a new genus, ''Rungwecebus'', named after Mount Rungwe, where it is found. The kipunji is the first ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Abbott's Duiker
The Abbott's duiker (''Cephalophus spadix''), also known as ''minde'' in Swahili, is a large, forest-dwelling duiker (small antelope) found only in a few scattered enclaves in Tanzania. It may be a subspecies of the yellow-backed duiker. It is very rare, and the first photograph of an Abbott's duiker in the wild was taken as recently as 2003. Characteristics Abbott's duikers stand around tall at the shoulder and weigh about . This duiker has a glossy, dark brown coat which is lighter on the underside. The face is paler and gray in color, with a large red tuft on the forehead; the horns are thin and short (). The secretive behavior of Abbott's duiker, along with its largely nocturnal habits and preference for dense vegetation, means little is known about the ecology and behavior of this species. It has been observed feeding on leaves in the forest understory, and on vegetation in forest clearings, and may feed on fruits, flowers and moss. An Abbott's duiker has also been seen wit ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mammal
Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur or hair, and three middle ear bones. These characteristics distinguish them from reptiles (including birds) from which they diverged in the Carboniferous, over 300 million years ago. Around 6,400 extant species of mammals have been described divided into 29 orders. The largest orders, in terms of number of species, are the rodents, bats, and Eulipotyphla (hedgehogs, moles, shrews, and others). The next three are the Primates (including humans, apes, monkeys, and others), the Artiodactyla ( cetaceans and even-toed ungulates), and the Carnivora (cats, dogs, seals, and others). In terms of cladistics, which reflects evolutionary history, mammals are the only living members of the Synapsida (synapsids); this clade, together with Saur ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Eastern Miombo Woodlands
The Eastern miombo woodlands (AT0706) are an ecoregion of grassland and woodland in northern Mozambique, southern Tanzania, and southeastern Malawi. Setting These species-rich savanna ecosystems cover wide areas of gentle hills and low valleys containing rivers and dambo wetlands. The region is located on the East African Plateau, extending from inland south-eastern Tanzania to cover the northern half of Mozambique, with small areas in neighbouring Malawi. They are a section of the belt of miombo woodland that crosses Africa south of the Congo rain forests and the savannas of East Africa. The ecoregion covers an area of . It is bounded by the Northern and Southern Zanzibar-Inhambane coastal forest mosaic to the east along the Indian Ocean, and by the Zambezian and mopane woodlands in the Zambezi lowlands to the southwest, and by Lake Malawi to the west. To the north and northwest, the forested Eastern Arc Mountains separate the eastern miombo woodlands from the Southern Acacia-C ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Miombo
The Miombo woodland is a tropical and subtropical grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome (in the World Wide Fund for Nature scheme) located primarily in Central Africa. It includes four woodland savanna ecoregions (listed below) characterized by the dominant presence of ''Brachystegia'' and ''Julbernardia'' species of trees, and has a range of climates ranging from humid to semi-arid, and tropical to subtropical or even temperate. The trees characteristically shed their leaves for a short period in the dry season to reduce water loss and produce a flush of new leaves just before the onset of the wet season with rich gold and red colours masking the underlying chlorophyll, reminiscent of autumn colours in the temperate zone. The woodland gets its name from ''miombo'' (plural, singular ''muombo''), the Bemba word for ''Brachystegia'' species. Other Bantu languages of the region, such as Swahili and Shona, have related if not identical words, such as Swahili ''miyombo'' (singular ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Udzungwa Mountains National Park
Udzungwa Mountains National Park is a national park in Tanzania with a size of 1,990 km2 (770 miles2). The habitats contained within the national park include tropical rainforest, mountain forest, miombo woodland, grassland and steppe. There is a vertical height range of 250–2,576 metres (the peak of Lohomero), which incorporates the Udzungwa Mountains part of the Eastern Arc Mountains. There are more than 400 bird species, 2500 plant species (25% of which are endemics Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found else ...) and 6 primate species. It has the second largest biodiversity of a national park in Africa. Six primate species have been recorded in the park, five of which are endemic. The Iringa red colobus and Sanje crested mangabey are only found in the Udzungwa Mount ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Endemism
Endemism is the state of a species being found in a single defined geographic location, such as an island, state, nation, country or other defined zone; organisms that are indigenous to a place are not endemic to it if they are also found elsewhere. For example, the Cape sugarbird is found exclusively in southwestern South Africa and is therefore said to be ''endemic'' to that particular part of the world. An endemic species can be also be referred to as an ''endemism'' or in scientific literature as an ''endemite''. For example '' Cytisus aeolicus'' is an endemite of the Italian flora. '' Adzharia renschi'' was once believed to be an endemite of the Caucasus, but it was later discovered to be a non-indigenous species from South America belonging to a different genus. The extreme opposite of an endemic species is one with a cosmopolitan distribution, having a global or widespread range. A rare alternative term for a species that is endemic is "precinctive", which applies to ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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